Help Me Rhonda

She Let Another Man Come Between Us and it Shattered our Plans

Depending on your perspective, dinner went smoothly. Jack cooked on the grill. Sam readied salads. Neither spoke, either during the preparations or while they ate. After the meal, they worked together as the efficient team they'd become over eight years of missions together to clear the dishes, wash them and put them away. And when those tasks were done, Jack went to the living room to lay a fire. It was there, his feet up, rubbing his belly in satisfaction, that Sam found him. She changed into jeans and pulled a cardigan around her bare shoulders, as the evening's chill settled over the little cabin.

Her jaw was still set in anger, but he chanced a few words in her direction. “Mind if I ask you a question?” She turned and stared at him, as if it had been so long since someone had spoken that she no longer understood English. He tried another couple of sentences. “I mean, I answered all your questions this morning. Don't I get a turn?” She turned her back on him, and for a moment he wondered if she was going to abandon him, leave him in the living room alone, so great was her antipathy toward him. But she surprised him and sat in the rocker by the side of the big sofa on which he was stretched, facing the fire.

“Go ahead,” she said tersely, pulling her sweater tighter around her, girding for battle.

He sat up and put his elbows on his long, spread-wide thighs, leaning forward, toward her. “Why did you accept Shanahan's proposal? Why did you agree to marry him?”

She wasn't looking at him. She was looking at the fire, the golden light flickering across her features and turning her eyes into hooded shadows. “I... well, I guess the truth is, you told me to get a life.” She sighed and continued, “You told me to get a life, so I went out and got one. I met Pete through my brother, Mark, and we dated and it was fun, and then he found out about the program...”

Jack snorted. He always thought that giving Pete Shanahan clearance was a mistake. If it had been his call, he would have arranged an accident on the job, or something. He was a cop, for crying out loud. It wasn't that difficult. But General Hammond allowed himself to be swayed by Carter, and, well, the rest was history.

Sam looked at him, as if she could read his mind. “He isn't a bad guy, Jack,” she said. Inwardly he exulted that she managed to lose the “sir”, before he responded.

“Okay, but that's no reason for you to marry him,” he said, trying to keep the grimness out of his voice.

She was quiet for a moment. “I thought I was in love with him. I thought it would work out. I thought ... I thought ...” She took in a deep breath and closed her eyes. “I thought there was no future for us,” she said, glancing at him. Her voice was so quiet, he had to strain to hear her. “Do you remember when I showed you Pete's ring and I asked you if things had been different... you said, 'I wouldn't be here'?”

He put his head in his hands. Yeah, he remembered. He remembered his gut wrenching. He remembered how hard it was to keep his face from showing how scared and angry and hurt he was. He remembered how he had to clamp down on his emotions. He remembered wanting to vomit afterwards. And he remembered what he said. Hearing it now, he could see how ambiguous it was, but at the time it was all he could manage to tell her, that he would give it all up if she wanted him. But it had to be her decision... she was the one with so much to lose. He wasn't going to do anything to force her into something she didn't want. So he lived with the heartbreak and tried to move on.

Until he found out she'd called off her wedding, and then it was a no-brainer. He got into his truck and went to her, because clearly she didn't want Shanahan. The only question was... did she want him?

They looked at each other, her face a mask of sorrow. “At that moment, Jack, I realized we had no future. You were and are my superior in the chain of command, Brigadier General Jack O'Neill, commanding officer of the SGC, and I am a Lieutenant Colonel under your command.” She looked away from him. “When you told me that I realized I was going to accept Pete's offer. I decided to get a life and marry him.”

They were both quiet, staring into the flames. Jack stood and poked the fire, adding another log. He came back to sit down, but instead he knelt at her side and took her hand. This had gotten so fucked up, he realized, because she'd misunderstood his declaration. And now he wasn't sure what to say, how to explain himself, or if it was even relevant. Holding her hand, the same issues still driving them both, he decided he still needed the decision to be hers. “So, why didn't you... Marry him, I mean?”

Her composure snapped and tears rolled down her cheeks. Sam looked down into his dear face. “I don't love him, Jack, not the way he loved me. I couldn't do that to him, and I won't do that to me.”

Without considering the consequences, Jack bowed his head, put his lips to her hand and kissed the knuckles. And Sam, without thinking about it, ran her other hand through his hair, the strands silky and spiky against her fingers. And when he raised his head they looked at each other for only the briefest of moments, before he kissed her, his hand cupping her chin, long fingers on her cheek. “And me?” he asked, holding his breath as he waited for her response.

She didn't hesitate. “It's always been you, Jack. It was never Pete, and I think he knew it. We both tried to pretend otherwise. He wasn't even surprised when I walked out... hurt, but not surprised.” She blinked once or twice, as if her mind were rebooting, allowing a new thought to take hold. “It's you, Jack. I'm in love with you.”

And before she could take it back or qualify it, he stood, pulling her up with him, ignoring the protests of his knees. His arms went around her, his mouth combining with hers, lips upon lips, his tongue seeking entry, tasting the salt of her tears. And, ever the quick study, Sam followed his lead, pulling him, fierce, against her. He tightened his hold on her, hands questing for her curves, his hips seeking her softness. He over-balanced, pushing her down onto the sofa, mourning the loss of her heat as she bent, a graceful sprawl on the surface below her. He followed her down, settling on top of her, her long legs on either side of him, finding her mouth again, needing to touch her everywhere at once.

He rocked into the cradle of her hips, and she moaned into his mouth, her hands fisting in his hair. She locked her heels behind him, trying to feel him through both their jeans. His hand locked onto her blond strands, pulling to expose the long, pale column of her neck, attacking it with his teeth, soothing her with his tongue. Pushed up on one elbow, he slipped under her top, needing her skin, seeking her breast. In hand, he caught the tight nipple through the fabric with his teeth, tugging, as her hips jammed up into his. He smiled. She pulled his hair... hard.

“Ow!” She pulled it again, not so hard this time, and he raised his head to look at her, a smirk very much like his own staring back at him.

“That's it!” he said, getting up.

“What?” she asked, mildly.

“I'm going to make us some room,” he said. He pushed everything away from the space in front of the fire, went to the bedroom and returned with a duvet, which he laid out on the floor. He reached for her, pulling her up, and into his arms, his mouth seeking hers. She insinuated her hands between them and began to unbutton his shirt, nipping at his neck along the way. He pushed her away and yanked her sweater down, off her shoulders, throwing it on the sofa, before he pulled her toward him again, slipping his hands under her top to feel the warm skin of her back.

Elegantly she knelt in front of him, waiting for him to join her, which he did, although with more crepitus, as his knees made themselves known. She pulled him down on top of her, her hands grabbing the open placket of shirt. He kissed her, unable to get enough of her mouth, her neck, her chest, her shoulders. He wanted nothing more than to strip her and fuck her, bury himself in her... and then make love to her the rest of the night. But he had to be certain that she was doing this for the right reasons. Reluctantly lifting his lips from the softness of her skin he spoke. “Are you sure?”

He watched a smile cross her face, getting larger and larger, until it was nearly blinding, the bluest of twin suns scouring his countenance. “Am I sure that I'm in love with you? Or am I sure that I want to make love with you? Or am I sure it's you I want? Or...” He interrupted her with a kiss, a breathless, toe-curling kiss that left no doubt in her body or her mind what he wanted. Of course, the trip cross-country was a dead-give-away, too, she thought. “I'm sure, Jack,” she said with finality.