Title: Land of Sky Blue Waters

Three days later, Jack grinned and shifted his position against Carter's back in the boat as he sent his line out over Spooner once again. The day was clear and cloudless, and the fish, being fish, were refusing to bite what so ever, which suited his mood exactly. Sam was leaning back against him as well, using him as a prop while she stared through the binoculars looking for evidence of drug production at the mouth of a tributary that led into the lake. They were alone: no houses, boats or human activity within 20 miles distant, as far as he could see. All and all, it was perfect.

The last three days had been pretty perfect as well. The amazing part was that Sam's plan had worked; after the first day's discussions, they'd both relaxed and the tension between them had settled down. And if maybe he touched her a bit more than was normal, well, neither one of them were ready to jump out of their skins anymore. All and all, things were good. They had also settled into a routine that exactly suited his mood; swimming, breakfast, then work on the cabin, followed by walks along his pond or nearby lakes or fishing for fish and the human foul they hadn't quite promised but in the end had mutually agreed they'd look into for Frank. There'd been picnics for lunch along the water shore, and dinners at the cabin followed by chess or watching the stars on his deck until late with a campfire slowly burning down as they talked. Somehow, she always ended up with her head on his shoulder as the evening progressed; it was comfortable to him now and somehow seemed right. And as they'd talked, he'd gotten to know how her mind worked, and her moods; gotten to know a bit about her past and let her into some of his as well.

He smiled to himself. He could certainly now add to his list of Carter classifications; sure, she was brilliant and beautiful; but that was just stating the obvious. The important part was that she was argumentative, driven, and in his opinion, naively optimistic. He suspected that the last was a characteristic that would remain with her the rest of her life, no matter what age. That, and the fact that she couldn't function without cream in her coffee, and indeed refused to even drink said coffee without cream, was clearly what characterized her charm, a charm that would last.

And he'd learned a lot that might come in handy later. The fact of the matter was that Carter was seriously accident-prone when she was distracted and off-duty. He would never have guessed it. Major Doctor Samantha Carter, who was one of the most sure-footed airmen he'd ever worked with, was just flat-out dangerous on earth. He grinned to himself, but took note of the problem. The first time she'd gotten distracted was with the electrical system, where she'd come close to burning herself and the rest of the cabin down. That he could explain as an accident. But in the last two days, she'd also managed to burn herself while working on the boat's engine, and to hurt her hand climbing down from the roof of the cabin while they were reworking the electrical system for the addition. In both cases, due to proximity, she'd ended up in his arms again, like the first time. Not that he was complaining, nope, not at all. But the irony of the situation was that having Carter land in his arms with regularity was almost becoming part of a comfortable routine.

The odd thing was she was obviously getting comfortable with him as well. For whatever reason, his habits didn't seem to grate on her like they had on Sara or most of his friends. In fact, she seemed to take them in stride. He grinned to himself and decided to up the ante. A 2IC who thought he was comfortable was fine, in fact great, but one who thought he might be predictable was something he couldn't afford. "So, Carter?"

"What?" She kept her eyes on the tributary, and shifted against his back. And yeah, she wasn't calling him Jack very often yet, but at least she'd stopped with the sirs and the Colonels. It was a start.

"This has been nice, but it isn't exactly going anywhere."

She sat up suddenly, obviously flustered. "What?"

He grinned to himself, finished bringing his line back in, and then casually turned towards her. "We're only covering five tributaries a day. There's at least five hundred miles of lake shore nearby, and at minimum 50 tributaries that might be the source. While this has been fun, it's not going to help Frank. " He raised his eyebrows in what he hoped was a surprised and innocent look. "Why? What did you think I meant?"

"I – never mind. It's not important."

"Ah." He grinned and looked at his watch. " Anyway, I called Frank this morning and suggested he come by the cabin at around four or so this afternoon to talk strategy. I also asked him if he could set us up with a seaplane that doesn't scream 'police' that we could use to scout the area. We can cover a lot more ground that way and the Cessna's too cumbersome to use around here. I thought we could do some reconnoitering tomorrow."

Carter recovered, as predicted. "Sounds like a plan."

He started breaking down his fishing rod, and cleaning up the gear in the boat.

She looked at him questioningly. "It's only two. There're still a couple of hours before we need to head back."

He shrugged. "I know. But I thought we might as well put up the ceiling fixture while we're waiting for Frank. If we take the plane out tomorrow, we won't have any time to work on the cabin."

He took her nod for a yes and started the engine.

TBC ...

A/N. Thanks for the comments on this tale and the alerts. I very much appreciate it. Sam