The following is the MA/R-rated version of Chapter 11, originally entitled, The Rise and Fall of Joseph Cartwright.  If the reader is not over 18 years of age, please return to the original Chapter 11.

Chapter 11 – MA/R-Rated Chapter

I had the most disturbing dreams. Dancing with Julia in the middle of the street in Virginia City while Adam was hanged on a gallows. Pa telling me that his youngest son was dead. Making love to Anna Weslingham in Pa’s bedroom; only it wasn’t Anna Weslingham, it was Evie. Absurdly and wonderfully, she had breasts that doubled in size when I touched them. And then, right at the end, it wasn’t Evie either, it was Clara Lennard. When I opened my eyes from that last dream, the light was creeping up in the sky and I couldn’t put aside a sense of restlessness that had been growing all night long.

The house was silent as I emerged from the barn. Mrs. Lennard would be up and about soon, but it was still early. Only the dogs stirred from their heap on the porch, stretching and wandering over to greet me.

On my way back from the outhouse, I stripped off my shirt and doused myself under the cold water. I had a small bar of soap, given to me by Mrs. Lennard, with which I scrubbed. I swilled more cold water over me to rinse, and stood up, shaking water from my hair and wiping my face with my shirt.

All I once, I knew I was being watched.

I lowered the shirt and lifted my head.

The woman stood on the porch with the open door behind her. Her thin cotton shift stirred in the almost imperceptible breeze. In the first rays of morning sunlight, her bare arms were white from the shoulders to the elbows, darkening as they went down to her brown wrists and hands. Her bare feet were white too, and her narrow ankles and calves, right up to where they disappeared beneath the shift. Over her shoulders, her blonde hair hung loose and long, trailing down like pale liquid over her shoulders. Her face was turned towards me, watching me without any sign of self conscious awareness. Even though she was a good thirty feet away, I could feel her stare boring into me as I stood, shirt poised, dripping water.

How long we stood there, unmoving, eyes fastened on each other, I do not know. All I know is that the slanting rays of early sunlight seemed to gild her pale, slender figure so she was like a porcelain angel, carved in white and gold. In the early morning brightness her face looked whole.

Finally, she turned and took slow steps back into the house. I watched her disappear inside, and still I didn’t move. The door remained open. I stared at the dark rectangle of the doorway and realized I was barely breathing. I dropped my eyes and took a deep breath. Darn! What was I thinking?

I lifted my head again and gazed back at the house. It was still and silent, but the door was standing wide, inviting me in. With slow, hesitant steps, I moved toward it.

On the threshold, I stopped. Clara Lennard was waiting, midway between the door and the bedroom, arms hanging loose at her sides. Her eyes fastened on mine, were no longer expressionless, but imploring. I read the unspoken question there as clearly as if I had heard her say it and my heart began to race.

I took a small step towards her and she didn’t back away. Two more steps and we were inches apart. I raised my hands and closed them tentatively around her delicately sculpted arms and still she didn’t recoil. I drew her towards me until our bodies were almost touching and our faces were so close, I could feel her breath on my throat. My heart jumped as she lifted her face to me. There was no mistaking what she was inviting me to do.

I lowered my lips to hers, and for a brief moment we lingered there, only our mouths touching lightly. I could taste the warmth of her in the soft full flesh. I brushed gently against her lower lip and felt her melt into me. Everything around me dissolved as the kiss deepened and our bodies pressed closer. Her fingers closed in my hair and I felt her draw me backwards —one step, two—towards the bedroom. I dragged my head free, and swallowed hard.

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

She met my gaze with a steadiness I had not seen in her eyes before. Without a word, she nodded. She pressed her lips back to mine with a fervency that took my breath away and we staggered clumsily to the bed. As we fell across sheets still rumpled from her last night’s sleep, my hands were already tugging my buttons undone. A strange little whimper, a tight, frightened sound froze my hand. I looked up, startled by the fear in her face.

“Do you want to stop?” My voice emerged strangled and hoarse. Stopping was the last thing in the world I wanted right then. But I could sense the tension in her body; see something akin to terror in her eyes.

She gave a tiny shake of her head. “No.”

“You’re sure?”

She took a deep breath. “Yes, I’m sure.”

I reached for the hem of her shift and drew it up over the pale flesh of her legs. I ran my hand over the rounded whiteness of her thighs, half expecting her to clamp them tight and resist me, yet they parted to my touch. Once more I looked at her face. The fear had gone, replaced by a fierce determination that made me pause again. But the sight of her nakedness had brought me too close to the edge. With my heart thudding hard enough to burst out of my chest, I rolled my body onto her and she shifted beneath me so that I found myself right where I needed to be. Even as the giddy pleasure mounted inside me, I was aware that she lay mute and still, but by then, it was too late for me to stop. It was over in moments. I was done, and she lay silent and unmoving beneath me.

I lifted my head and saw her watching me, eyes wide and anxious in her pale face. A rush of guilt swept through me. She had said she wanted this, but hers was not the face of a woman who had enjoyed any part of what had just taken place.

I rolled away and stood up, hitching my pants together as she pulled her chemise back down to cover her legs. Adam was always telling me I should think things through properly before dashing into situations, and he was right. I had followed my body as usual without properly engaging my brain, and I now I had no idea what to do next.

Mrs. Lennard sat up, brushing hair back from her face with her hands. She spoke in a small, stiff voice. “Thank you.”

Thank you? I turned, dismayed.

She blushed as I met her eye, but once again, she held my gaze. “Stay,” she said, and it was half question, half invitation. “Please.”

All at once, I understood. What she’d done was an offering to persuade me to stay. And all this time I’d been convinced she wanted me gone! I shook my head, perplexed.

“You didn’t want to do that. Why didn’t you say so? I would have stopped, you know.”

She gave a little nod. “I know. That’s why it was all right.”

I groaned, because it wasn’t all right. She’d lain there, compliant, but scared. It was as if I’d used her. And after everything she’d done for me.

“So, will you stay?” The desperation in her voice was unmistakable.

I closed my eyes and rubbed my hands over my face. What had I done? I forced myself to turn and face her, trying to meet her eyes, but she wouldn’t look at me now.

“All right,” I said, finally. “But—but only if we can do that again.”

Reluctantly, she raised her eyes to me. Her face had paled further and she swallowed hard. She gave a small nod. “If that’s what you want.” I could hear the flat resignation in her voice.

I sat down beside her and traced the puckered skin of her cheek with my fingers. She tried to turn her face away.

“Don’t!” she pleaded, but I caught her chin and drew her back. I ran my mouth across her jaw, and kissed the twisted scar, while she tensed beneath me. I caught the flicker of fear in her eyes. My lips brushed hers as I kissed her again. And then again. I held her close in my arms and over and over I kissed her.

I let my hands stroke her back but when my touch strayed to the curve of her waist, she flinched. Yet she was responding to my kisses, her mouth growing ever more eager. I stroked her back and nuzzled her honey-scented hair. Finally, with careful deliberation, I slid my hand from her back and let it rest against the swell of her breast through the flimsy lawn. She drew a small, sharp breath, but she didn’t pull away.

Clara Lennard wasn’t endowed with generous curves like Julia or Anna Weslingham, yet her lean, firm body beneath the thin cotton fabric sent familiar thrills of anticipation deep down into my belly. I eased her back onto the bed, thinking maybe she would falter as I once again drew the shift over her knees and then up, over her ivory smooth thighs, but her eyes were both wary and trusting. She even eased her hips upwards so I could draw the garment under her. Slowly and carefully, I uncovered her long, slim body, aware of the shiver that went through her as the fabric trailed over the tips of her small, tight breasts. Then she raised her arms, like an obedient child as I drew the chemise over her head.

Slender and pale, she lay naked beside me, her face full of fresh apprehension. Her arms reached out to me, as though for reassurance. I held her, running my hands up and down the long, smooth curve of her back to the swell of her haunches, battling the overwhelming urge to do what needed to be done to relieve the burning in my own aching groin. I thought of her pale, anxious face and her strained “thank you” and held back with renewed deliberation. I would not finish this, I vowed, until her body was begging for release as desperately as mine.

I remembered what Julia had taught me. “Take it slow,” she had said, time and time again. I’d laughed once when she lifted my face between her hands and said, “Don’t always dash straight for the finishing line, Joe. Take the scenic route.”

So I took the scenic route with Clara Lennard, and sensed her breathing grow hard and fast, her arms draw me closer, her body arch to my touch. I heard her soft moan as our hot tongues met, felt her leg curl around me, her hips lift as her body, finally succumbing to its own instincts, began to move against me.

And then her hand was pushing down between us, fumbling for my buttons. I reached down to help her. She rolled onto her back, her legs clamping around me. I gave in to instinct then, my body separating itself from my conscious mind and following its own greedy desire. Some little remnant of sensible thought registered that this time the woman’s hips thrust as fiercely as mine. I heard the catch of her breath before I was lost in my own helpless pleasure.

Blood thudding in my brain, half delirious with exhausted satisfaction, I finally slumped, my head on her shoulder. As my breathing steadied, I was uncomfortably aware that, once again, she lay silent and unmoving under me. Pleasure turned to dread as I raised my face to look at her.

She had turned away, her eyes closed, yet on her cheek a telltale glimmer caught the light from the window. I dropped my face again, with another groan.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” I stopped, unsure what I should say. After a few seconds, I tried again. “I just wanted…I just wanted to make you…happy.”

Still she didn’t move or say anything. My anxiety was fast turning to full-blown guilt. Maybe I needed to leave after all. I started to rise and her arms closed around me. She turned to face me.

“You did,” she said. “And I am. I am happy.”

I dropped my head to her shoulder in relief. She stroked my hair and hugged me close. I breathed in her honey scent and closed my eyes. I don’t know which of us fell asleep first, but when I awoke, we were still wrapped around each other. I gazed down at the mangled side of her face and felt no revulsion, only a surge of unexpected protectiveness. I stroked her hair and kissed her face, and a fresh surge of desire tightened inside me. For the first time in many months, I felt as if I was floating on a warm lake of contentment. I had felt like this when Julia and I had lain together in each other’s arms, when nothing had seemed to matter but the two of us and the pleasure to be had from each other’s bodies.

And it was that simple. We became lovers that day, Clara and I. I had never thought I could feel about another woman the way I had felt about Julia, and yet Clara enthralled me. Conversation was still sparse, and her natural reserve remained intact, but it was as if, having made the decision to trust me, she yielded herself completely.

There were just the two of us, secure in our own private dream. And it was private too. No one ever came to the farm. Over the years, Clara had discouraged even her neighbors from calling. So we were left entirely to ourselves, no prying eyes or wagging tongues to mar our happiness, and I was in a permanent state of heady bliss.

“We should get married,” I said one day, three weeks into our new relationship. It was only midday, but we lay in bed together, my cheek on her breast. We hadn’t begun in bed. Clara had come outside to call me from the barn to eat, but when I’d stepped into the kitchen and seen here there, setting the table, her cheeks flushed from the heat of the stove, the food was forgotten.

“Where would we get married?” she asked, pulling a face. “Angels Creek?”

In my half drunken reverie, I almost said, “How about Virginia City?” but I stopped myself just in time. We’d been lovers for three whole weeks, but I still hadn’t told Clara my real identity or anything about where I’d come from, and she never asked. It troubled me a little, but I shrugged the unease aside. Living our isolated existence, it was easy to pretend this was all the life there was, had ever been. And I didn’t want it to end. Didn’t want to spoil it.

I let my hand trail over the little rise of her belly. “Would you like to marry me?”

She smiled down at me and kissed the top of my head. “I don’t care whether we’re married or not. We’re here together; that’s all that matters to me.

“It doesn’t worry you, living in sin?”

She thought about that for a moment, then she said, “How can this be sin? We are married, Joe. We don’t need a priest and a church to tell us that. This—this being together—the way we are, that’s marriage. It’s a marriage of souls.”

I raised my face to look at her more closely. Her words made sense to me. I’d known deep down, when I was with Julia, that it was true. “I’m not sure the rest of the world sees it that way.”

“To hell with the rest of the world. Look what the rest of the world did to me. This is my world, Joe. You’re my world. You and the farm and the dogs and the goats. I don’t need any other.”

“I love you,” I told her.

She looked at me oddly then, in a way that made my stomach knot. “Do you?” she asked.

“Yes.” I put as much certainty into the word as I could, but her eyes were still doubtful. Why was she looking at me that way? “Don’t you believe me?”

“Yes,” she said, but she meant something more than just yes. I drew a little away from her. She must have seen my hurt because she pulled me back and stroked my hair. “I do believe you, Joe. I’m just not certain why.”

“What do you mean?”

She turned her face away, and I knew what she meant. “If you think it matters to me, about your face….”

She didn’t reply. I found myself frowning. Clara’s reticence and her cryptic answers baffled me. “Do you think I’m that shallow?” I was unable to keep the note of annoyance out of my voice. We’d been lovers for three weeks and this was the closest we’d come to falling out, and I wasn’t even certain what the problem was.

“How long will you stay, Joe?”

She caught me off guard. I stared at her, somewhere between surprise and dismay. The truth was, I hadn’t really given the future any serious consideration. In fact, I was trying to ignore the future – and the past – as best I could.

“I’m not planning on leaving,” I told her.

“Ever?” she asked. When I hesitated, she said, “You were the one who mentioned marriage, Joe. Marriage is forever. Would you be happy to stay here, forever?”

“Of course!” I replied with so much vehemence that for a moment I almost convinced myself I was certain. The truth was, I was certain of nothing.

She smiled at me then. I was relieved to see she believed me. She leaned in and kissed my face. “Oh, Joe!” she whispered, and I was sure I heard sadness in her voice. I didn’t want to feel sad. I didn’t want to think of the world beyond the farm. I didn’t even want to look at the scar on her face. I wanted to lose myself in her body again and again; think of nothing but the promise of rapturous oblivion. I nuzzled into her breast and I felt her lips press against the top of my head as she folded her arms around me and pulled me to her. I didn’t need another world either. For now, this was enough.

“I do love you Clara,” I whispered. “I do.”