Corporate shark Sarah Atwood finally reveals her ulterior motive with Jamie Dutton.
Spoiler alert! Do not proceed if you have not watched the sixth episode of Yellowstone season 5.
At long last, Sarah Atwood (Dawn Olivieri) has revealed her ulterior motive with Jamie Dutton (Wes Bentley). Following his ill-advised rendezvous in the previous episode, Jamie in Sunday night's episode found himself literally in bed "with the opposition." And it's interesting to see how his devious mind works, because what's got him troubled isn't that he's betraying his family by sleeping with the enemy -- literally and figuratively -- it's that a woman like her can be in bed with someone like him.
"It's a coincidence that [Market Equities'] outside counsel keeps finding her way to the bed of the opposition," Jamie says.
But Sarah takes offense to that, at least it seems that way. It's still difficult to tell if she's truly into Jamie or if this is just another web she's spinning to trap Jamie.
"When you insinuate that I'm here for any reason other than I want to be here, you're insinuating that I would use sex to achieve a particular goal within my profession, which is to say that I'm being paid to have sex with you, which is to call me a whore," she says. "Is that what you're doing, calling me a whore, Jamie?"
Jamie tells her it doesn't add up, how someone like her can be with someone like him. After hearing this, Sarah has zero qualms about calling out his insecurities.
"Are you so insecure that the only explanation for me wanting to have sex with you is anything other than me just wanting to?" Sarah asks rhetorically. "I mean, what could I possibly see in a 6-foot tall Harvard law graduate holding the second-most powerful public office in the state? You're so sure that I have all of these ulterior motives, then why the hell would you bring me to your house?"
Jamie quips, "Have you looked at a mirror lately?"
Sensing an opening, Sarah gets to work.
"Let me ask you this? Why aren't you governor?" she asks. "I mean, you clearly have the skill for it."
Sarah reminds him that he deftly orchestrated a bill so that he, as the state attorney general, could also unravel it so brilliantly that Market Equities had no legal recourse, thus forcing Market Equities to summon CEO Caroline Weaver back to New York.
After lathering him up, Sarah finally puts all her cards on the table for Jamie to see in plain sight.
"Here's my ulterior motive, you wanna hear it?" she says. "Get you elected governor. Reinstate our lease and push through our project with a contract that you cannot weasel out of and save this state from its policy of hiding its head in the sand hoping that the rest of the world just walks by."
Sarah then tells him, while holding his hand, that that wasn't her motive "until i found myself naked in your house arguing about why I'm naked in your house."
After laying out her plan, Sarah jumps in the shower. And, perhaps to everyone's surprise, Jamie follows suit and walks in before joking, "We try and conserve water in this state."
"I do not have to f**k you to give you money for your campaign," she assures him as they stand face to face in the shower. "I'm here because I wanna be here."
Jamie caves.
"Help me win governor," he says, "and I'll give you your airport."
Sarah says waiting four years is not a suitable option for Market Equities. It needs to happen much sooner.
Near the end of the episode, they're both on the couch watching the news, only to see John getting favorable coverage, never mind that he blew off the president. He's seen in the news consoling a grieving wife who lost her husband on John's journey to brand cattle.
"I swear that man could fall on a pile of cow s**t and come up smelling like a rose," Jamie says looking at the TV in disgust. "I admit, he's hard to beat in a fair fight."
Sarah agrees, and then suggests a more sinister plan with little room for interpretation -- she wants to take John out for good.
"I don't think we can let him show up to the fight, Jamie" Sarah says.
In the meantime, John's embarked on his journey to brand cattle, and Beth's tagged along for the ride. But, in typical Beth Dutton fashion, she wonders if anyone thought to pack vodka for the trip.
John's not loving that Beth's ruining the moment for him, as he attempts to soak in the gorgeous horizon.
"Yeah, I see it dad. It's very pretty," Beth says with more than a hint of sarcasm.
John orders Beth and Rip to stay put.
"I'm gonna go down 100 yards where she can't ruin it for me," John says.
Beth tries to salvage the situation, to no avail.
"It's the same view from the porch, just a different angle!" she shouts.
After a rare day nap, Beth's invited to scope out the spot where Rip planned on marrying her. The view takes her breath away, forcing her to admit she jumped the gun with her shotgun wedding in the season 4 finale. After settling under one of the countless trees, Rip's romantic side surfaces when he surprises her with a flask of whiskey and then a pack of cigarettes.
"You know I'm blowing you anyway, right?" she assures him. "You don't have to work so hard. You're a perfect motherfu**er."
Sitting under a tree with the love of her life next to her, Beth concedes.
"I could do this. I could live here and never see another person in my whole life except you. I don't need anything else. Cigarettes. Whiskey. A meadow. And you," she says.
Back at the ranch, Monica and the rest of the crew are preparing for a feast to welcome home the ranchers. Summer (Piper Perabo) stayed behind and was tasked with getting a better sense of the Duttons and understand their ways.
Monica tries lending a hand by explaining how the Duttons have embraced her because they know she's not a threat to their land. This prompts Monica to ask Summer, the environmentalist, if she's a threat, but Summer's not sure. She admits she has no idea what the land represents.
In a very Taylor Sheridan move, who in the past has been vocal about his disdain for big cities like Los Angeles, Monica romanticizes the countryside while denigrating big cities.
"It looks the same it did a century ago, same it did a thousand years ago. What does Bozeman represent, that's the question," Monica says. "And Portland and Phoenix and Los Angeles for that matter."
Summer insists every city represents something different, but Monica disagrees before comparing and contrasting what makes the countryside the place to live.
"No they don't. They say the same thing," Monica says. "Every summer there's fire and every winter there's blizzards. One cleanses the forest and one protects it, then feeds its rivers in the springs, which feeds the valley. Those two same things happen in the city and they're devastating, because cities are the opposite of nature. They defy it, which is why they always crumble. I mean, these mountains have been around for 80 million years and they'll be around for millions more. Name a city that'll stand that long."
Summer's not amused.
"Everywhere I go, I get a lecture in this place," she says, to which Monica replies with, "Well, now you know what it feels like."
Meanwhile, Thomas Rainwater finds himself in a battle to maintain power as chairman of the Broken Rock Indian Reservation. Rainwater's driver and assistant, Mo, feels, hears and then sees trouble brewing when a score of military helicopters fly over his home. The powerful choppers fly so low, the entire house trembles.
Mo drives into town to investigate what the commotion's all about, only to find out the President of the United States has scheduled an impromptu visit to the reservation, an invitation orchestrated by tribal lawyer Angela Blue Thunder, who is the one behind a move that would see Rainwater lose his chairmanship.
Rainwater's had an inkling Blue Thunder was up to something for some time now, but her plans were finally revealed when she confronts him at the event. She also insists it's important for the president to visit their people so the country knows they're not invincible.
"Obama visited Standing Rock two years ago before he tried to run a pipeline through it," Rainwater fires back. "Presidents don't see us, even when they're standing in front of us."
Blue Thunder says this time it'll be different, largely in part because she's been appointed to be the president's director of Native American affairs. And, for good measure, she also reveals the president is there to endorse Rainwater's rival.
As night sets on the ranchers, John and his old pal, Emmett Walsh (Buck Taylor), are settling in for the night. Emmett, a rancher and chairman of the Stockgrowers Association and former head of the Montana Fish & Game, applauds John for being a rancher at heart.
"Governor of Montana on the side of a mountain sleeping with his boots on," Emmett says. "This world may have a chance yet."
As Walsh lays his head back for a snoozer, John unsuccessfully convinces him to stay up.
"You keep your head up on that saddle, you old bastard," John tells him. "I don't need to listen to you."
Within a second, Emmet is snoring, prompting John to put an old saying to the test.
"My dad used to say, if you can't sleep through a man's snoring, you ain't tired enough," he says. "I guess we'll see."
The next morning, John finds Emmett's died peacefully in his sleep.
"Well, Emmett. I couldn't have dreamed up a better death if you paid me," John eulogizes Emmett. "You sure earned it old friend."
When Rip asks what happened, John responds, "He didn't wake up. He just died on the trail, like every cowboy dreams of."
When they all return to the ranch, John rushes to be the first one to reach Emmett's wife so he can deliver the tragic news. When she asks how he died, John delivers in poetic fashion.
"Like a cowboy should," he tells her. "Head rested against a saddle, staring at the stars."
After delivering the grim news, all John could do is offer a shoulder for her to cry on, and that she did.
Later, John's old flame, former Montana governor and now U.S. Senator Lynelle Perry, meets up with John at the ranch for lunch. The meeting leads to some friendly sparring when she calls him out for commuting Summer's prison sentence.
"John, there's politically incorrect and then there's politically illiterate," she tells him, "and you're the latter."
He insists he's just helping Summer out of a bad spot.
"You know, I've noticed that there's never any ugly women in bad spots around you," Lynelle fires back.
He wonders if she's jealous.
"Maybe. A little," she says. "Speaking of, I've been seeing Paul Finer and I just figured you should hear it from me."
John's beside himself, not at the fact she's dating but that she would date someone whose political views differ from hers, calling him a hypocrite.
"Yeah, that's the one," Lynelle says. "And we have differences in policy, but he's a good man. He's a kind man."
Unfazed, John wants to know just one thing.
"Does he make you laugh?" he asks.
She says he does.
"Well, f*** then," John says. "It has a chance."
Lynelle pivots the conversation and reminds John that the president's going to be in Helena and he should try to be there to welcome him.
"Nah, I have nothing to say to that idiot," John responds.
Perhaps feeling vulnerable after hearing Lynelle's news, John asks Summer if she wants to dance. She declines, explaining she has no idea how to dance whatever it is they're dancing. John tells her they're just swaying. Summer has a better idea.
"Why don't you ask your MILF senator?" Summer asks.
John's not amused and tells her, "You know, just once I'd like to have a simple relationship with a woman."
Summer hits back, "Find a simple woman. Or stop sending 70 mixed signals."
John heads over to the senator, and after putting up a fight -- like telling him she doesn't "wanna step on the inmates' toes" -- Lynelle gives in and reveals to John she wishes "there were two of you 'cause I would actually marry the one that's less charming and more sensible."
John thinks there's a compliment somewhere, but Lynelle assures him there isn't.
While their romance's clearly kaput, the same cannot be said of Yellowstone ranch hand Ryan (Ian Bohen) and Abby (Lainey Wilson). They share their first kiss on the quasi-dance floor and he's blown away by her lips and her immense talent as a singer.
And a new romance seems to also be brewing between Carter (Finn Little) and a young lady who asks him for a dance. He's sheepish at first, but ultimately agrees to let her teach him some dance moves. Yes, Carter's officially all grown up.
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