A/N: This chapter has TWs for mentions of Charlie's death and for mild violence. (Pete's back).
Jack pushed his truck toward the 90 mph mark as they raced up I-25 toward Denver. It had taken them less than 30 minutes to swing by his house and grab the combat bug-out bag he kept under the bed. Sam had grabbed hers when she woke him then John to explain her revelation.
The bastard was going after Sara. Jack knew he should have figured it out as soon as John had shown up, but he'd been preoccupied.
"Can you drive any faster?" John growled from the backseat of the crew cab.
"Any faster and I'll have a cop up my ass," Jack growled back. "Do you want us all to end up in jail?"
"Daniel and Teal'c are about forty minutes behind us," Sam said, putting their teammates on speaker before John could reply.
"Did you call Walter?" Jack immediately asked Daniel.
"We did," Daniel replied. "He's tweaking the search parameters to focus on the Winter Park area, but Jack, there aren't many street cams there."
"I know," Jack grumbled, edging the truck closer to 95 on the speedometer.
"It was a miracle we got a picture of him the first time."
"I know!" Jack bit back, then softened his tone, "I know."
"Did you try to call Sara?" Daniel asked, unhelpfully.
"Of course we called her!" John growled viciously. "It went to voicemail. Neither one of us is stupid despite popular opinion," he spat, his face contorting in anger and fear. "I'm sorry, I just…hate this," he said in a pain-filled voice.
"Hey," Sam placed a hand on John's shoulder, feeling him sag into her touch, "we get it. It's okay."
Sam flipped the cell off speaker.
"Is that what Jack was like as a teenager?" Daniel muttered seemingly to Teal'c under his breath.
"No," Sam snapped at him, not willing to put up with any more delays, "this is what he's like whenever he feels backed into a corner. You've just always had the benefit of usually seeing his command filter," she glanced at John then Jack, earning an arched eyebrow from each as they tried to guess what Daniel had said. "Call us if you hear anything and Daniel," Sam swallowed hard. "You and Teal'c be careful."
No sooner than the call ended, Jack's cell rang. He answered it using the truck's Bluetooth connection without looking at the caller ID.
"Jack, honey, it's me," Sara's voice said over the truck's speaker, making his entire body go rigid.
"Oh fuck," John breathed out, squeezing his eyes shut. He looked at Sam and mouthed code to her.
"Hi, Shnookums," Jack replied smoothly.
"I saw I missed your call," Sara said smoothly. "0530 is a little early don't you think?" She chuckled nervously.
"I just wanted to let you know I might be dropping by," Jack said smoothly, his knuckles white on the steering wheel.
"No need," Sara told him, but even Sam heard the slight tremor in her voice. "A friend stopped by. We're gonna head toward my mother's for the day. Why don't you come by tomorrow. We haven't talked in a while."
"Sounds good," Jack said, "tell mom I said hello."
"Will do. Bye."
The call ended and Jack hit the accelerator. Cops be damned. "Shanahan's already there," Jack cursed. "That was a code—"
"I know," Sam interrupted him. He glanced at her and she told him without words that he didn't need to explain anything. It didn't surprise her in the least that they had some sort of code for danger. Sam knew Jack's history. He'd dealt catastrophic blows to some bad people over the years. If they'd ever discovered his identity, well Sam didn't want to imagine what could have happened to Sara.
"Sara's mom hated me, well, him," John jerked a thumb at Jack. "She's also not alive."
"So Pete's keeping her at the house," Sam put the pieces together. "He wants you to come tomorrow and walk into an ambush."
"Do you think he caught on?" John asked, eyeing Jack warily. They'd all heard the tremors in Sara's voice.
"I don't know," Jack pursed his lips, "but it doesn't matter. We're going in anyway."
"We can't," Sam shook her head. "He'll shoot you on sight."
"Then I'll go," John said.
"He thinks you're my son," Jack grumbled. "He's already tried to grab you once."
"I dare him to try again," John said.
"He'd probably kill you, thinking Jack wouldn't be able to survive losing another son. Sorry," she told them when they both glared at her. "You know I'm right."
Jack begrudgingly gave her a sharp nod, while John just continued to glare at her. She'd just come close to crossing a pretty big line, but it was one she knew Pete would exploit.
"We could just shoot the bastard from the sidewalk," John suggested.
"I have to be the one to go in," Sam stated firmly.
"Absolutely not," John snapped.
"Carter," Jack drew her name out in a warning tone.
"Jack, you know it's the only way," she countered. "You said it yourself, he doesn't want me dead."
"No, but look at what he did last time," Jack looked at her, his eyes full of emotion.
"He came at me when I was at less than half capacity," Sam countered. "He wouldn't stand a chance against me now and you know it."
"You can't seriously be considering this!" John thundered at Jack's silence. "It's bad enough he has Sara but to hand him both of them!"
"Carter can hold her own," Jack said simply. Inside he was dying at the thought of sending her in there to face Shanahan. "And we need to get eyes on Sara. Plus it'll give us the time and distraction we need to get into position. The house has a basement. I'm too big to fit through the basement egress windows, but you're not," he nodded to John.
"I remember it," John replied. "Give me a zat and I'll make sure he goes down."
"He won't see you coming," Sam told John. "He will be expecting you, though," she touched Jack's arm.
"I can hold my own," he told her, echoing his earlier words.
Sam nodded, knowing watching each other walk into danger was something they were going to have to get used to doing all over again.
"Well done," Pete told Sara, holding his free hand out for her cell phone. His other hand clutched a gun, his finger resting lightly against the trigger. Tossing the phone onto the table, he smashed it with the butt of the handgun.
"Now what?" Sara asked, letting her disdain for her captor slip through. She'd used the code Jack had taught her years ago, but now all she could do was stall and pray he'd get here in time. And it was a long drive from Colorado Springs.
"Now, you're going to tell me all about your ex-husband's sins," Pete motioned for her to sit in a dining room chair. When she complied, he sat down across from her, laying the gun in front of him, his finger still on the trigger.
Sara scoffed. "Where should I begin?"
Pete grinned at her. "Why don't you start with something simple," he ordered. "And we can work up to his hero complex."
"Simple like he always left the toilet seat up or as in, how he killed my son?" Sara cocked her head and studied the man across from her, waiting for his reaction to her provocative statement.
"Sam knows about Jack's brat," Pete rolled his eyes. "I need something more damning."
It took everything within Sara not to launch herself across the table at the way he callously dismissed Charlie. Instead, she swallowed her hatred and dissected his words. "Sam? As in Samantha, Jack's second-in-command?"
"Yes," Pete snapped, "Samantha Carter, my girlfriend, is obsessed with your ex-husband and refuses to see how toxic he is."
Sara felt her mouth gape open at his words. She'd only met Sam a handful of times, but she'd known from the moment she saw her and Jack together that there was an attraction. At least on Jack's part. Sam had been much harder to read.
Sara had noticed immediately that Jack watched his young 2IC with a look that Sara hadn't seen since she and Jack were dating. It was a type of intensity that used to take her breath away. But she also knew her ex-husband had an overdeveloped sense of duty and honor. It was why, after almost a decade since their divorce, she knew Jack would still be there if and when she needed him. It was also why she carried guilt to this day over the way she'd treated him following Charlie's death.
"I've only met Sam a couple of times, but she seems highly intelligent," Sara replied carefully. "Why on Earth would she be obsessed with Jack?" She swallowed, hoping her captor wouldn't see through her lie. She knew exactly why someone like Sam would be attracted to Jack, despite the obvious age difference.
"I know, right?" Pete scoffed in agreement. "He's old enough to be her father!"
Not quite , Sara cringed inwardly. Although, if what Pete was telling her was true, she could guess the age difference was something Jack likely struggled with.
"He certainly has flaws," Sara nodded, knowing she needed to keep him talking. "He can be childish and overly pragmatic. He can't grill worth a damn," she sighed heavily. "He's honorable to a fault."
"Those aren't exactly terrible sins," Pete pinned her with a sharp stare.
"No, they're not," Sara shrugged, fighting back her internal panic. "But he was also married to his work more than he was to me. I felt neglected but because he was putting his life on the line for 'our country,' I also felt selfish. It eventually made me resentful." Sara admitted. She'd gone to a lot of counseling since her son's death and it'd unpacked a lot of past hurts.
"So he wasn't an attentive husband? That's all you've got?" Pete seethed. "I assume next you're going to tell me he was an amazing lover?"
Sara blinked rapidly at his unexpected words. Jack had been an extremely adept lover. It was one of the reasons their marriage had lasted as long as it had, despite his long deployments. Whenever they had been together, Jack had made her feel like the most important person in his world.
"You've got to be kidding me," Pete surged to his feet, gripping the gun tightly as he gestured. "The worst things you can say about your ex-husband are that he's honorable to a fault and great in bed!?"
"Jack's just like everyone else," Sara tried to reason with him, "he's got good and bad qualities. The way he never asked me what I wanted in life and just assumed I'd always be content being the doting military wife or how I could tell he'd rather be in the field than at home with me the last couple of years," Sara felt her voice crack, "or how he never talked about his feelings. Ever. Those aren't exactly glowing qualities."
"Come on!" Pete growled, bending forward to get right in her face, "You have to have something damning about him! He killed your son! Why are you protecting him?!"
Sara reacted, using the opening of Pete's exposed face to strike out like Jack had taught her. She jammed the heel of her hand upward, catching him under this chin and snapping his teeth together with a loud crack. Springing to her feet, she took off, but Pete snagged her arm, jerking her off her feet and shoving her to the floor.
"Fuck!" Pete cussed, spitting a piece of a chipped tooth out. He lashed out, kicking Sara hard in her stomach. "I tried to be the nice guy," Pete growled, his hand fisting in her hair as he dragged her up before flinging her back into the chair. "But I guess you want to do this the hard way."