During the California Gold Rush, when a naive widow forms an intense bond with the alluring wife of a wealthy prospector, she must navigate her newfound sexuality in secret to survive in a dangerous patriarchal boomtown - where love and liberty have consequences and sacrifice comes with the territory. (THE POWER OF THE DOG meets GONE GIRL)

SYNOPSIS:

The year is 1850...

CLAIRE ALLEN, a humble mining supply store owner, has just buried her late husband and is left to raise two small children alone in the developing town of Oleta, California. When ASHLEY DELAMAR, an ambitious entrepreneur, and his beguiling new wife, HELENA, arrive from Pennsylvania by stagecoach, Claire learns of Mister DeLamar's revolutionary mining endeavors and fears that she will soon be out of business.

Shortly after the women meet, they bond over a picnic... and a boundary-pushing game of quid pro quo. When Helena shares that Mister DeLamar is abusive, Claire eventually reveals an even darker secret... that she witnessed her late husband kill a man for his money and has carried the burden ever since. During the next few weeks, the assembly of Mister DeLamar’s Hydraulic Machine progresses and renders Claire’s inventory of pickaxes and pans redundant when he begins to offer similar mining tools to his employees. Unable to compete with his tactics, Claire rebrands the store into an apothecary with Helena's help. Soon, their camaraderie and magnetic chemistry ignite into a romantic partnership, and their stolen time is filled with stolen kisses.

As Claire finds herself alive again and in love, perhaps, for the first time, her happiness is cut short when JOAQUIN ANDERSON, a bounty hunter, wrangles Claire for her late husband's crime. Terrified, Claire takes Helena's suggestion to offer Joaquin the remaining stolen money in exchange for her freedom. Luckily, Joaquin takes the buyout and vanishes. However, things take a turn for the worse when Mister DeLamar questions the nature of Helena and Claire's relationship and demands they have no further contact with one another. Desperate to secure her inheritance, Helena poisons Mister DeLamar with the deadly datura plants that grow nearby, killing him along with his plans to turn Oleta into a successful boomtown.

Just when Claire thinks she and Helena are finally free to live together in peace, the town's sheriff announces his investigation into Mister DeLamar's cause of death. When confronted with evidence of her guilt, Helena stabs the sheriff in Claire's kitchen, silencing his suspicions of her while leaving Claire with the burden of being an accomplice to murder... again. In a devastating three-point finale, Claire discovers, a little too late, that Helena has framed her for the murder of Mister DeLamar and the sheriff to save her own neck. Claire is immediately arrested by the sheriff’s deputy and hanged as Helena disappears into the darkened desert... forsaking her completely.

Months later, Helena has relocated with Claire's children somewhere outside California when a familiar face approaches on horseback... it's Joaquin, the "bounty hunter." And in a final twist, it’s revealed that Helena isn't Helena at all. She is a con artist who's been groomed by Joaquin and working with him the whole time. With the amount of money they made scamming Mister DeLamar and Claire, Joaquin proposes that Helena settle down with him and form a family with Claire's unsuspecting orphaned children. However, Helena didn't forsake love and the last of her humanity just to submit to someone else's agenda. In a calculated act of liberation, Helena kills Joaquin, hoping to save what little she has left of her...for herself.