Note: I have too much fun writing GWTW fanfics, but this one was hard to write. You'll read how I struggled with a second chapter, but so many reviewers asked for it. So...like it or love it or leave it, here it is.

It wasn't until two weeks later when Scarlett was lying in an unfamiliar bed, with the coarse sheets pulled up to her chin and the roar of a train engine rumbling underneath, that she realized she had ruined her life.

In after years when she thought of the short, whirlwind period of her engagement she would never quite remember the details. Time and places jumbled together into a kaleidoscope of colors and impressions. The only bright spots in her memory were the reactions of her parents when they had first confronted her about her decision—her father's drunken ranting at Twelve Oaks, his florid cheeks aflame with brandy and disbelief, and her mother's pale shock and urgent, hushed pleas to wait, to think it over, to do anything, but go forward with the marriage.

She knew Butler had somehow managed to conciliate her pa, had ended that humid, dusty April day by leading Gerald's horse all the way back to Tara, with her father slouched over on the saddle, and Scarlett and her sisters trailing silently behind in the wagon. Forever would she recall that rushed, fumbling moment when her mother had swept down the wide stairs, softly commanding Pork to carry her husband upstairs to his bedroom, and then hesitantly extending the offer for Butler to stay over for the night, Ellen's eyes growing wider and wider as they flitted between her eldest daughter and this mysterious, dark stranger. Butler had held out his hand to Scarlett then, she thought she remembered, had tenderly led her into her own home, as though it was his home and his threshold through which he stepped, and she the stranger, the outsider, the unknown. And for all purposes, it might as well have been.

The next two weeks, not barely two weeks, had streamed by with relentless force, and Scarlett a dazed bystander to the approaching doom. She barely remembered her hurt ankle, the way she had hobbled to and fro for a few days, viewing the world through a lens of pain so great that a sprain was the least of her worries, the physical ache a dull release from the numbness within. Her neighbors' shock too had been lost in the shuffle of chaotic wedding and war plans, their looks of surprise and expressions of reproach, locked behind closed doors and years of southern hospitality. Some wives and daughters had merely raised their eye brows, slapped open their fans, and through silent nods and gestures agreed that Scarlett's slick, strange marriage was the only possible outcome for a girl who flouted propriety at every opportunity. Although most folks of Clayton County barely had time to give the marriage pause, the scandal of an unexpected, unsuited match nothing compared to the great, looming disaster of war.

For Scarlett, even the hot, impotent vows of the Tarleton twins to kill themselves, kill her, and most especially kill that no-good Yankee sympathizer who had somehow seduced her into matrimony, had fizzled and faded away as smoke in the breeze. Memories lost, never to be recovered. Only her parents, and, despite her attempt to forget, to erase them for good, Ashley and Melanie's whitewashed and gaunt faces, their stalwart and valiant attendance at her hasty, sparsely-attended wedding would remain with her, would flare up as specters in her dreams or as ghosts in her waking hours. Yet she could not really say even that much. She had not said much at all.

Everything had happened too quickly, and Scarlett had let it happen, watching her life pass before her as though she had no control over where it was going or how it would end. It had been a dream, a terrible, terrible dream. If she had pinched herself hard enough, she would have woken up. She should have woken up. That is what she had told herself, what she had whispered during the sleepless nights and muttered during the day, while she had adamantly refused to stop it from coming and stubbornly, doggedly thrown herself into the future.

But then it did happen. The marriage done, the bride and groom hurried off before supper time to catch a train, jammed into an overnight compartment on the last ride out of Jonesboro, heading off to the sea and Charleston, and as far away from Tara and Ellen, and the sweet, abundant life she had known, had only ever known, and so carelessly, callously discarded. She was alone, more alone than she had ever been, and the only comfort would be the company of a man she hardly knew, had hardly seen since the morning after his proposal, and who she hardly even liked.

The train rocked back and forth, careening around a sudden bend in the tracks, and she bit down on her lip, sinking her teeth further into her flesh as Butler suddenly slipped inside their compartment. He had stepped out about an hour before to enjoy a free night cap, and she had been too relieved to realize that the courtesy drink had been entirely for her benefit.

He nodded at her and she nodded back. She watched him watch her, see through the blankets to her shivering body, to her skin, exposed and vulnerable in the silk nightgown her mother had carefully folded into her case earlier that week, and her mind was immediately pulled into a hundred different directions. He turned away toward his valise and Scarlett's eyes spun up and down his body.

He wore a grey traveling suit, cut and tailored elegantly along his tall, wide build. Every strand of his thick, obsidian hair lay perfectly flat and his brown skin appeared almost golden in the low light of the train's lamps. He moved, stretching out of his jacket, the muscles in his arms rolling as ocean waves beneath his thin, white shirt, and sat down on the bench just inches from where she was forgetting to breathe. She stared at his sprawling chest, at how wide his shoulders spanned, and at how large his hands were, and her blood pounded loudly in her ears.

None of Scarlett's chaste kisses and coquettish airs had prepared her for this night. She knew nothing of what men were like or what they liked, and she didn't want to know. Two days ago Ellen, as red as the Georgian clay, had approached her and told her that there were certain expectations a husband had of his wife, and that a lady must endure those bizarre desires, suffer through the pain and mortification so that children might come and men might be content. Her mother had not explained more, no hint of how the actual honeymoon night would pass away, no extra blush on what the details of the end of her maidenhood might entail.

She knew nothing, nothing at all, but the fear creeping up her throat and the panic paralyzing her lungs, nothing but the utter expanse and foreignness of the man who was facing her, his sharp features blurred in the hazy glow of the compartment and his eyes glittering ominously a foot away.

Out of the shadows, Butler struck a match, and the spark of the flint sizzled with the sound of a thousand bonfires in Scarlett's head. It was enough to break her trance and she jumped, clenching the sheets up with her and knocking back against the wall.

"Don't you dare come near me," she rasped. "Don't you dare touch me."

Butler did not immediately respond, but looked at her, sucking slowly on a cigar. Cornered against the wall, Scarlett panted and prayed. She had no idea what he would do next. She trusted him now as little as she had trusted him on their first encounter.

For a full five minutes he smoked on and she panted. Soon a fragrant cloud hovered in the compartment. The smell reminded her of her father's scent and her heart and breathing slowed. Butler tossed the cigar aside and swung his legs out, as at ease as a panther on a perch.

"Scarlett, do you know why I came back?"

Confused, she twisted the sheets between her fingers and shook her head. "Came back?"

"Yes."

"Came back to the compartment?"

He laughed and leaned forward. "No, came back and married you."

"Oh," she exhaled and cast her eyes down. Instantly her mind called forth those moments during the last two weeks when the fog of her detached wonder had lifted and she had briefly felt the untempered horror and folly of her breakneck engagement, and had wished Butler would never return. Why had he returned? It would have been so fine if he had never come back. She peeked at him through her bristly lashes and glared.

He noticed and laughed again, his teeth gleaming brilliantly against his tan face. She hated that stupid laugh of his. It always made her feel like she was on the wrong side of a joke, the butt of it or outside of it.

"Tell me Scarlett, did you wear your rosaries out praying for my demise? Or, at least, for me to live up to my rakish reputation and leave you stranded at the altar?"

"No!" she cried, flipping her head up. His dancing eyes gave her the lie and she nervously licked her lips. "I would never."

"Well then, your faith is far greater than most. It was the height of bad manners for me to behave so honorably, when you had every reason to hope for the worst."

She lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes. "So why did you come back and marry me? I know it wasn't for my sake, or honor's sake. Did you do it for a good laugh? I think you would do almost anything for a good laugh, Mr. Butler."

His smile fell and a shadow passed over his face. A tingling swirl of fear started to skitter up Scarlett's spine and she wondered if she had crossed the line by calling him Mr. Butler. She fidgeted under his opaque gaze, hugging the scratchy sheet against her raised skin. Again he made her wait, to wonder and heave as he pierced her with those black, black eyes.

"You are such a child," he whispered at last. "And whatever else you may think, Scarlett, I did come back for your sake. Call it some forgotten sentimentality from my childhood or leftover hope from my youth, but for whatever reason, I couldn't ruin you."

He stood up abruptly and started to undress. Dumbstruck Scarlett stared at him, without seeing him. She hadn't expected him to be so sincere. She hadn't known he could be that genuine. Out of their brief interactions she had only ever heard him be flippant and cynical, jeering and cool. Who was this man—her husband?

Husband. The word thudded dully in her brain, the off-key chord of a broken piano. Husband. It clanged again and again. She, Scarlett O'Hara, had a husband. With the word, came the image, came the reality, and her eyes focused on the man. And then she gasped.

Butler was shirtless, his entire back exposed, the muscles of his body no longer obscured by cotton and colors. He bent over to finish unlacing his boots and she could see every sinuous rivulet shiver and expand. He was tan to his waist, with a swell of thick, black hair on his chest, and without the clever lines of a tailor, he was more massive, no more a southern gentleman but a rough sailor or a wild pirate,

Heat spilled into Scarlett's face and seeped down her neck. She slunk down onto the mattress and turned away. The sight of his nudity had wiped every other thought from her mind but the remembrance of where she was and what was expected of her. All the crippling anxiety washed over her anew, spiked with more potency. She closed her eyes and started muttering a Hail Mary.

She heard the lamp sputter out and felt the bed sink as Butler sat down beside her.

"Scarlett?"

"Yes?"

"What are you doing?"

She didn't want to answer him, but she didn't want to come off as a coward either. She opened her eyes, grateful for the dark.

"That's none of your business."

"I think it is."

"I don't care what you think."

"Nevertheless. I want you to answer me."

He shifted closer, still sitting up, and Scarlett scooted nearer to the wall. The roar of the train hummed in her ear and she blew out her breath.

"I was praying."

"I thought so," he muttered, chuckling. Suddenly he leaned over her, his breath blasting on her face. "It won't save you from me. I have the laws of man, and for once, even the laws of God, on my side."

"You wouldn't dare." Her voice quivered.

"Wouldn't I?"

"I'll scream if you touch me."

"One day, I promise you, you'll scream if I don't."

She couldn't make out his expression. He was only a darker shade of tar in a lightless room. But his voice carried a smirk.

"Are you, are you teasing me?"

"Maybe I'm seducing you." He rubbed his thumb along her jaw and she froze. "Or maybe, maybe I'm trying to tell you without actually repeating myself that I won't ruin you."

Soft lips brushed the top of her head and he moved back. The mattress creaked as his weight lifted off the bed. He swiped a pillow from beside her and crouched down onto the floor. Not for the first time tonight Scarlett was left speechless. She squinted into the pitch at him, baffled and relieved and a little humiliated.

"You aren't…you don't…" she stammered, blood pooling warmly in her cheeks. "Don't you want to share my bed?"

The outline of his head and shoulders popped up. "What a leading question for a chaste, southern bride."

She could just feel his mocking grin, the way his eyes were melting with mischief and ridicule, and she flipped onto her side. Oh, why couldn't she have just rolled over and tried to sleep? Her body was screaming for rest. Curse her rambling tongue!

"I…I would like to go to sleep now."

"And you will, but not before I say something that hardly needs to be said, my vain ingénue. Did it never occur to you that this is as new an experience for me as it is for you?"

"Fiddle-dee-dee," she scoffed.

He chuckled and tapped his hand on the mattress, jostling her. "I may have been in many women's beds, but I have never shared my bed with a woman, and certainly not one who was my wife."

Scarlett dug her nails into the blankets, blushing from hairline to heel. What kind of a husband talked about his former lovers with his wife? She had heard about men who preyed upon girls, or visited bawdy houses, but she had always supposed they were strangers—foreigners or drunkards or Yankees—not men she knew, not the man who was her husband.

He laughed again and drawled on, "No, I don't tell you this to make you blush or shock you. I tell you this so that you know I am not afraid of you. In fact, some might even say I have a gift in the art of seduction, and as kind or strange as my forbearance seems tonight, it is not entirely altruistic and certainly not without explanation."

"I don't care to hear your explanation."

"I will tell you it all the same. First, I don't like the idea of lying with a child who may still be in love with another man."

Scarlett scowled. "I'm not a child. And I'm not in love with anyone."

"I won't quibble about the first point, but I was witness to that precious scene at Twelve Oaks, and knowing the type of girl you are, and knowing the type of man Ashley Wilkes is, I don't trust your emphatic second denial."

"I was young and silly. It was a foolish mistake."

"It was two weeks ago."

"A lot can change in two weeks."

"Evidently."

Scarlett ground her teeth together. More than Butler, much more than herself, she blamed her troubles on Ashley Wilkes. It was his fault she had been tricked and cajoled, prodded and bound to this loveless, luckless marriage. It was his hands that had soiled her reputation, his obstinate, drowsy rebuff that had tarnished her bright future and saddled her with nothing but broken dreams and shattered hopes.

She knew she had never loved before—knew that the man she had thought she loved did not exist, had never existed, and those feelings of infatuation and admiration had hardened, turned by resentment and disappointment, into a deep, seething contempt. Her youth and inexperience made this singular disappointment in her life the hinge upon which the rest of her days would turn. That sweet love, which would have crystallized into an immovable obsession, had broken into a thousand jagged pieces; had become the one true thing in her life. She didn't know the man she had married. She didn't know what she was going to do about her destroyed world. But she knew she hated Ashley Wilkes.

And here was Butler, goading her, teasing her, nettling her in his silky, nasty way about the only thing she knew for certain. Her voice was low and the truth in her words as cold and unforgiving as ice.

"I don't care what you think you know about me, but I do not love anyone. Not you. Not some other man. And as God as my witness, not Ashley Wilkes."

The train trundled on, the wind howled, and Butler let out a low whistle.

"That makes my second reason for not claiming my matrimonial privileges that much more difficult to follow, and that much more important to heed."

"I'm going to sleep," she spat, her anger spiked and her nerves tender. "I don't care to hear any more of your reasons."

"Oh but you do!" he exclaimed. "I cannot permit you to spend even one night laboring under the delusion that I am impotent or uninterested."

From the depths of the floor, his arm snaked out, grabbed at her shoulder, and unceremoniously shook her onto her back. She yelped and plucked at the tumbling, tangled sheets, fumbling in the dark and despising the sound of his low, rumbling laughter.

"You really are the most vulgar man I have ever met," she yelled into the night.

"Then you haven't met many men."

He braced his arms around her and she felt the scratch of his arm hair against her bare shoulders, could smell the fragrance of brandy and cigars on his breath. He was all around her, without her being able to see him, and the suffocating blindness made everything more frightening, and somehow more intimate. Her heart thumped and her muscles tensed.

"I will scream. I mean it."

"And what do you think would happen if you screamed? Who would come to save you? They all know this is our honeymoon night. The conductor and railway staff are staying as far away from our compartment as possible, and if they do hear you scream, they'd only wink at me or smack me on the back, in the morning."

"I…I thought you said…"

"I'm not going to force myself on you tonight, Scarlett, or any night for that matter. I'm only trying to answer your question, since you were ignorant or brash enough to ask it."

He eased back and her body relaxed. She knew he was still close, the shadowy contours of his body somewhere within her reach, but her pulse flowed to a steady beat and she sighed.

"I don't think I'm going to like being married."

"I don't think you know what marriage is," he replied. "But that's neither here nor there at the moment. Scarlett have you ever had to break a horse?"

"No."

"Well I have. It's a tricky business. You find a wild colt, with a mean buck and a world of promise, and you have to break it just right so that you don't turn all that potential power and grace into nothing but a beautiful, useless beast. A truly untamed animal requires time to become a powerful racehorse."

She had only partially been listening, but she had heard enough. "Are you calling me a horse?"

"There's hope for you yet, my pet. Yes, I am. And when I'm through with you, I'll be able to ride you like the wind."

He barked a high-pitched chortle and Scarlett rustled deeper into the bed, uncomfortable and offended, though she didn't quite understand why.

"What's so funny?"

"You are."

"Because you think I'm a horse?"

"No, because for all your low-cut dresses and daring flirtations, you're as pure as Diana, and because, you know nothing of men. Nothing at all, my dear. You thought I didn't want you. What man under eighty and over twelve wouldn't want you in his bed? With your soft curves," he slid his finger along her hip and she sucked in her breath, "your creamy skin," he skimmed his thumb across the edge of her collar bone, "and those eyes, that since the moment I saw you bewitching Charles Hamilton with them, have wanted to know just what shade of green they'd turn when I kissed you?"

Scarlett sensed the prickle of his breath before she felt the heat of his lips. They were slow and hot, and his mustache tickled her skin. He pressed the kiss deeper and longer, sending tremors from the base of her neck down through her spine. She'd never been kissed like this, never known the sting of passion and the chill of desire that rushed over the flesh and into the blood. She was frightened and blind, clinging to a mass of skin and fire, and somehow kissing the unseen darkness back.

The kiss could have lasted one minute or one hour, time evaporating meaninglessly into the void of the room. When he pulled away, sliding off the bed without a muttering a word and leaving her feeling cold and suddenly so much more alone, she couldn't move or blink. Her body was still reacting to the thrill of his touch, the slow burn of his lips, the exhilarating shock of his tongue in her mouth, and the weight of his body on top of her own. Each sensation was a new fascination. Each caress had evoked a new emotion. She didn't know if her blood was pumping fast or slow. Was her breathing shallow or heavy?

He had kissed her at their wedding, a brief blush of touch, but this had been something new and different and invigorating. It had been electric and earthy, lightning packed into a single touch. And she wondered, gripping at the emptiness around her, if this meant she loved him. But she didn't know. She didn't trust herself.

Everything in her world was spinning out of her control, her entire life being thrust forward, speeding by on tracks that led to nowhere. She ached for a dreamless escape. The violence of the changes that were erupting all around her had welled up a storm of emotion that would only be calmed by the still, still hours of night. But for two weeks she hadn't been able to sleep. For two weeks she had been unable to find release. And now, her heart was drumming against her rib cage, and she wanted to know what would happen if Butler, if Rhett touched her again, wanted to know as much as she feared what would happen if he touched her again.

Exhausted and confused she broke down, sobbing and crying over all that she had lost and everything she had forsaken—her home, her family, her freedom. She wanted to reverse time, to return to that BBQ at Twelve Oaks and soak in the adoration of the men, glory in the envy of every other woman there, and dance and dance late into the night, never confessing her girlish love to Ashley, never being shoved into marriage, never hearing the call of the boys as they fled down the steps and cheered for the oncoming war. She wanted everything and everyone back—and nothing and no one of what she had now.

She didn't know when it happened, but at some point, Rhett was beside her, cradling her in his sturdy arms, whispering tender nothings into her ear, drying her tears and wiping away the grief and sadness, and shock, the utter shock, of the last two weeks. He was so warm and kind, and she remembered that he had been kind before, on the bench when she had finally seen Ashley clearly for the first time. For a silent sob she spared a thought for her husband, thinking that things might not be so bad, that her life might not be completely ruined. But the hope was fleeting, a sliver of light that slipped through her grasp before she had time to truly feel it. She was too young and hurt and lost for anything but despair to linger.

Late into the night she wept, and Rhett held her, never shushing or mocking her. He just comforted her, letting the salty sorrow of her young heart spill out onto him and wet his skin. She forgot he was shirtless, that her cheek was pressed against his bare chest, and that her own body was exposed, the blankets and sheets loosening from around her shoulders and revealing her sheer nightgown and undraped limbs. She was wrapped up in his strong embrace and the black night, until her sobs stilled and she gradually drifted off to sleep.