The next morning:

At five thirty on the dot, Sam blinked her eyes open to a large black nose and a long wet tongue licking her chin hopefully. "Gah. Hutch. Gross." She grumbled and moved to get up only to find her hips pinned by a warm arm. Sam turned and stared into beautiful brown eyes regarding her silently.

He tugged her back down and murmured 'C'mere' before claiming her mouth until she whimpered with need.

"Jack?"

"Carter."

"Oh god, what did we do?" Memories flooded back from the night before of sleepy seduction and really phenomenal sexual release some time last night.

"Do you... not remember?" He asked in concern. He was certain she'd been sober.

"No, no I remember what we did. Oh boy, do I remember what we did." She said in such a way that earned her a smug self satisfied grin. "What did we do?"

He hummed in thought. "We can handle this whichever way you like. Choice A is that you and I made love because we never really stopped loving each other and couldn't take it anymore. Choice B is that both of us were drunk or so tired that we didn't really use our brains and fell into bed because it's been a long few months and we were drunk or over tired, possibly both and horny. Or if you want to be really creative we can both pretend we have no recollection at all of what happened last night and it is entirely my imagination that there is a hickey on your left breast."

Sam blinked at him. He'd just give her a pass. Just like that. Because he loved her. "Dammit, why do you have to make it so hard to not love you?" She asked him finally.

"Is that a trick question Carter because I just woke up in bed with the woman I love who hasn't got so much as a stitch of clothing on her and right now I want to kick the dog out so I can remind her of exactly what we did last night."

"Dammit Jack." But her tone was a regretful sigh and Jack's face fell.

"Ok, we pretend nothing happened. I'll go let the dog out." He said stiffly.

"That's not it." She said sharply.

"Then what is it Carter because I've got no problem thumbing my nose at the government on this one. Clearly how I feel about you isn't going to just clear up. God knows I've tried." He said, his laugh a humorless bark of self flagellation.

Sam drew her knees up, crossed her arms over them and put her face down. Jack didn't realize she was crying until her shoulders started to shake.

"Oh no you don't. You don't get to fold into yourself and not tell me what's wrong Sam. Talk to me. That's an order if it needs to be."

She lifted her tear streaked face. Her lower lip trembled. "I… promise me you'll take care of the kids."

"Sam are you dying?" He asked, mildly panicked.

"No." She said miserably and shook her head. "It's just after I tell you I'll be going to jail." The last word was muffled by her face buried back into her arms.

"Stop that Carter. You couldn't have done anything that bad." Jack couldn't imagine anything Sam would be wiling to do besides sleep with him obviously that would get her into that kind of trouble.

"How am I supposed to go after Pete for forging my name when I've done the same thing?"

"Sam, what are you talking about?" Jack was at an utter loss. She was making no sense. "What did you forge?"

"Your signature on... on…" she trailed off and looked sick.
"Ok, so you signed my name on something. Big deal. I'm sure you had your reasons Carter, it's not the end of the world."

She choked on a slightly unhinged laugh. "You won't say that when I tell you exactly what I forged your name on."

In his gentlest voice because she was clearly deeply upset at the very idea of telling him, Jack asked her. "Sam, just tell me. It will be ok, I promise whatever it is, it will be ok."

She looked at him a long moment. It was too late not to tell him now. "Pete's infertile." She said softly.

"What does that have to do with any… ah." Jack looked thoughtful. "So… Jake is…?" his finger flipped between them.

"Your son." She said sadly.

Jack's expression was blank at first while he put together what she'd actually done.

Sam sighed despondently.

"Well that explains an awful lot." He finally said and before she understood what was going on he'd crowded her and pressed her back against the bed and was kissing her senseless.

"Jack?" She asked him in confusion. This was not even close to the reaction she had expected.

"Sam, I spent the last couple weeks thinking out how to tell that little boy that it doesn't matter who your biological parent is, the man that raises you and loves you is your father. I don't have to now. When he's old enough I can tell him the truth. He probably won't have the bad memories of Pete like Georgie does but it's still going to cause trust issues. Shit. I'm going to have to deal with that other thing sooner than I'd planned because of this. Dammit." He took Sam's face between his hands. "You should have just asked. I'd have done it anyway."

"What?"

"You heard me."

"Why though?"

"Sam, you once convinced me to put a snake in my head knowing how much I hate those things after what they did to you and I did it anyway because I love you and you asked me to. You think a little lying to your jackass ex-husband was going to bother me?" He grinned. "I'd have loved knowing that his kids were my boys because he's a defective piece of crap."

Sam still looked incredulous. "I guess Jon does know how you'd react." She said absently.

"Wait. Jon knows?" he asked alarmed.

"And Vala."

"Vala? Why does Vala know? Who else knows?"

"Jon won't tell anyone and I swore Vala to secrecy."

"Sam!" He said now very alarmed. "Why are you telling everyone but me this?"

"I didn't tell them. Vala wanted to check if Daniel was right about Georgie and Jon couldn't give Jake a good reason why he couldn't try too."

"Oy."

"Yah."

"Well, this is a problem." He said.

"No kidding." She sighed.

"Still not your craziest idea though."

"Close."

"Real close. Yup."

Hutch woofed.

"I'll let the dog out. Go shower. You smell like lust." He smirked. "I'm not complaining but Vala will notice."

She nodded slowly.

As he led the dog out after he'd thrown his shirt and pants on. "Oh and Carter?"

"Yah?"

"This wasn't a one time deal. We will be doing this again." He waved his hand back and forth between them for emphasis. Then he left with the dog.

Sam fell back against the pillows. "Yah sure, you betcha," She sing-songed in a fair imitation of his accent when he got silly and deliberately got as folksy as he could manage.