Carter was driving slightly over the speed limit; worry keeping her foot on the accelerator whilst guilt at breaking the law (in the company of a police officer, no less) stopped her from pressing the pedal flat to the floor.

Pete, smiling slightly, touched her arm lightly. "Sam. She's seventeen. I'm sure she can handle us being a little late."

Sam smiled, keeping her eyes on the road. "I know, I know. I just..."

"Iknow 'you just,'" her fiancé returned, "Stop panicking. You really think O'Neill would let her go anywhere or do anything stupid?"

He had spoken the words as reassurance but her stomach clenched as he said that name and the weight of guilt that had lifted over their weekend together returned full measure. She knew in her heart of hearts that she owed it to her former CO to see him in person about her engagement and resignation; knew she had taken the easy way (the coward's way a part of her insisted) out by simply dropping the letter on his desk for him to find and read; leaving O'Neill unable or unwilling to contact her about its content, as she had already gone away for the weekend.

Forcing her foot to relax a little, their speed dropped to under the legal limit and Pete put the radio on, lying back in his chair with his eyes closed in the warmth of the sun. She had fought him tooth and nail to drive home, almost on the brink of arm-wrestling before he had bowed to her wishes, but now he seemed perfectly content to let her drive.

Three and a half hours later than she had specified, Carter pulled onto the drive of her home, nearly hitting the truck already parked there.

O'Neill's truck.

Her stomach lurched with guilt again.

She was pulling the keys to her home out of her handbag as Pete attempted to manhandle her suitcase out of the boot and up the drive when the door opened. Cassie stood with her hand on the door, a half-disapproving half-amused look on her face. Behind her stood O'Neill; his hands entrenched in the pockets of his jeans as was usual.

For a moment their eyes met and she felt her face flush. The hurt in his eyes was palpable; a terrible force that seemed to draw her into their hazel depths. She had betrayed him in a most horrible way and as he stood there, face blank and eyes full of emotion she felt like crying.

"Hi, you pair," Pete said behind her, dragging her back into the real world and forcing her to swallow her guilt and blink away the beginnings of tears, "Had a good weekend?"

"Not too bad," Cassie replied jovially as O'Neill nodded behind her, a simple inclination of his head.

Pete made no secret of liking Cassie, and on the few occasions they had met previously he had got on well with O'Neill; to the mild surprise of several people not least O'Neill himself. Now O'Neill was wrestling between the twin desires to congratulate the policeman or thump him senseless. He didn't feel the jealousy he had expected to feel upon once again encountering the man who had finally, undoubtably, beaten him in the race for Carter's heart; more a sense of hopelessness that filled him with the desperate desire to get the hell out of Carter's house.

"I'm gonna make tracks," he announced awkwardly, silencing an animated conversation between the three others.

"Oh. Ok," Carter said, looking relieved. "I'll move my car..."

"See you around Cassie... Pete," he managed, moving swiftly towards the door

"See you."

"See you soon Jack."

"Sir?" Carter said as soon as she had shut the front door, not quite to so she would be able to get back inside without using her key.

He turned to face her. "You resigned Carter. Lose the sir."

She cringed slightly at his voice, most unlike herself, and he hated for the weakness. This wasn't the Sam Carter he knew, flustered and apologetic. He wanted the woman he loved back, standing in front of him now, the woman who could out-shoot, out-run, out-fight, out-fly and out-think her contemporaries. This was Sam soon-to-be-Shanahan; a woman who could show her vulnerability and be loved for it. This Samantha has no connection with Jack O'Neill, he thought savagely.

"Okay," she said, trying to keep her voice light, "Jack."

He hated himself for losing his wall of anger as she spoke his name; hated the way the aggression that seemed to be powering him drained away. He knew his eyes had softened, the lines on his face becoming less deep. "Yeah?" he asked.

"I'm sorry I didn't come to see you in person."

He nodded. "Me too."

She stood stock still for a moment, not knowing how to reply, and then moved to her car, unlocking the door as he did the same. Just before he slid into the driver's seat she spoke again.

"I had to move on. Don't hate me for that."

He shut the door, the clonk of the metal and rubber his answer. He was smiling slightly to himself, the anger returning. At least the last words she had spoken to him had been more like the Carter he knew; confident, full of valid self-justification.

He reversed onto the street and drove away, his last view of her in his mirror as she stepped back inside her home, glancing along the road before she shut the door.

He lay awake, thinking of a particular smile.

I had to move on. Don't hate me for that."

Hate her? He had nearly laughed out loud. I don't hate her. That's the whole damn problem.

He turned over and buried his face in his pillow, wishing his head would empty and he could sleep.

His errant brain apparently had other ideas. He found himself thinking about the moment he had first met Carter; his first words to her.

"Ah, here we go another scientist. General, please!"

She had looked at him with a fierce energy in her eyes, a kind of hatred. He'd felt himself being thrown off balance.

He grinned into his pillow.

She'd managed to get the last word with her challenge of an arm wrestle; and he'd been hooked. He remembered walking up the ramp and her words to him:

"You really will like me when you get to know me, Colonel."

"Oh, I adore you already Captain."

He had found her attractive; what man wouldn't? And when he was forty-two and still dying his hair brown it seemed... well, not too disgusting for a man fifteen years her senior to find her attractive.

And there'd been a time when it had seemed really possible that Jack O'Neill and Sam Carter might, one day, be an item. It'd been fun simply to be around her; knowing that he'd die for this woman and taking a secret joy from that fact.

But things had changed again. After the za'tarc testing; when he'd suffered the dual humiliation and joy of confessing those feelings to her and hearing the same thing back... things gradually became different. The realisation began to set in that he and Carter might never be together and their relationship had soured a little.

His grin faded.

And now she had Pete. And he had looked in the mirror and seen a much older reflection than he remembered looking back. The thought had struck him suddenly that he was too old for Sam Carter.

So he'd tried to modify those feelings. Tried to feel for her in the same way Daniel did, the same way Teal'c did. Tried to think of her as his little sister. But things don't work like that, do they?

And now they were getting married and he seemed destined for a life of unrequited love.

He sighed, turned over again and pummeled his pillow.