Inescapable: Chapter 3

AN: Disclaimer and all in Chapter 1. My brain sways from too much whiskey … so please forgive anything you don't like.

"What are you doing here?"

Daniel grinned at Jack's grouchy face as he opened his door to him. Daniel shrugged, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

"We …" he motioned to Teal'c sitting in the car outside Jack's house. "Thought we'd save you the bother of driving."

"Uhuh," Jack said reaching for something behind the door and stepping outside with Daniel. Daniel soundlessly moved out of his way and turned towards the car with a sly smile as Jack locked up. "Afraid I'd forget the way to Carter's?" He asked with a bite in his tone.

Daniel raised an eyebrow as they hopped into the car. "I know how selective your memory is at times."

"Easy, Daniel," Jack warned, looking in the rear-view mirror giving Daniel a glare. Daniel ignored him. Still burning holes in Daniel's reflection, Jack caught sight of a pink box in the back seat. He turned his head over his shoulder to get a better look. "What's that?"

Daniel sighed. "Cake, Jack."

"Excellent!" Jack exclaimed, turning his attention back to the road and briefly forgetting his foul mood for just a second. "Thought Carter was dealing with that." He heard Daniel sigh and didn't need to look in the mirror to know he was rolling his eyes.

"You thought, Jack," Daniel said with exasperation. "We thought it'd be nice if she didn't have to arrange a cake for her own party." Jack's shoulders shot up in indifference.

"She promised me frosting," he said simply. "Lots."

Daniel stared hard at the back of Jack's head as Teal'c offered him a quick eyebrow. I hope this is worth it, Daniel thought.

"Foods great, Sam," Daniel told her as he shoved another bite of his burger into his mouth. She smiled as she squirted ketchup onto her own burger. She had gotten the food for a BBQ that she and Pete were supposed to have last weekend but she'd ended up working and had forgotten about it. A curse from just inside her kitchen caught both their attention. Jack was swiping at beer he had spilled down his chest while opening it and was frowning as his head whipped around in search of something to dry himself with. Teal'c stood beside him, mildly amused.

"He doesn't seem to be enjoying himself," Sam said quietly, her eyes looking out over her garden, checking again that she had turned the BBQ off.

"When does he ever?" Daniel replied brushing crumbs from his now empty hands. "Besides, he hasn't got cake yet."

Sam laughed lightly and set her burger down, she didn't really want it anyway and cake sounded much better. Jack had been surprisingly quiet since he'd arrived and what was even more surprising was that he was trying his best to appear cheerful. She supposed it wouldn't last much longer.

"Well this just gets better and better," Jack muttered but in the silence surrounding, they all heard it. He didn't notice, still wiping beer off his fingers. "Carter – did you shake all of these beers up or just mine?" He shouted in annoyance as he gave up looking for a cloth. Sam's eyes darted to him. Her eyes only twitched at the nuisance on his face. She looked away quickly and decided to pretend she hadn't heard him.

"I'll get the cake," Sam announced and scurried off to get it.

Jack grimaced as she shuffled past him, purposefully not meeting his eyes. You're a real ass, you know that? He berated himself.

"Nice one, Jack," Daniel hissed under his breath as he followed Sam inside with urgency. Whether or not he'd meant Jack to hear him, he did.

For cryin' out loud!

"Sam?"

Daniel approached her slowly as she stood with her back to him at the bench, her hands on the edge of it, bracing herself. He noticed the cake was over beside the fridge, on the other side of the room.

"Sam?"

"This was a bad idea, Daniel," she called over her shoulder, not turning around.

"He's just being Jack, Sam," he offered with a sigh. "Nothing we're not used to."

"So … where's the cake?"

Sam flinched but refused to turn around. Daniel however, spun around to glare at Jack. Jack pocketed his hands and tilted his head a little, wearing an expression that said 'I know'.

"Teal'c's wondering if you're gonna eat that hotdog, Daniel." Jack stared hard at Daniel then glanced to Carter. Daniel watched him a moment, following his eyes, then started to walk outside, throwing Jack a reproaching stare as he did.

"Soo…" Jack said, pacing around the kitchen.

"I'll bring the cake out in a minute," Carter said crisply, starting to busy herself with getting it prepared.

"I didn't come for the cake." A muffled laugh of indignation came from her lips as she began to cut the cake. "Carter," Jack called gently for her attention. She ignored him. He sighed, pulling his hands out of his pockets and walked towards her. "Sam?"

He wasn't sure if it was his use of her name or the hand that almost wasn't gripping her elbow, but she turned with a jolt. Her sapphire eyes sparkled at him and he somehow found it painful to keep looking into them. His hand dropped and he backed off her a little, gazing at the ground.

"I'm sorry," he whispered awkwardly after seconds of charged silence.

"For what?" She asked, seemingly unaffected.

His eyes slid up briefly. "You know." She raised an eyebrow at him, demanding he continue. When he didn't she shook her head in frustration and turned around again.

"All right!" Jack yelled. She turned slowly, hands on her hips. "I'm being an ass," he admitted grudgingly. She remained simply staring at him, intrigued. Jack sighed and scratched his head. "I know I haven't been the most pleasant of people to be around lately." Her eyebrows flew up and sarcasm flooded silently into her features. He narrowed his eyes momentarily at her then shook it from his thoughts. "Or even at the best of times but I guess recently… I've been touchier than Daniel without caffeine."

Aha! A smile… ish.

"You know how I hate parties, Carter." Or at least ones that involve you, another man and especially a ring, he added to himself. "Unless there are scantily clothed women and a chunk full of money in my…" Her gaze told him he should stop, right now. He winced; thissort of humour wasn't going to cut it, not this time. No easy way out.

Damn.

A shrill tone from the garden made them both jump slightly and stretch their gazes to the door. A moment of intent listening alerted Carter to the fact it was her cell phone. The noise stopped abruptly. She didn't care. She returned her eyes to Jack and he looked away instantly, uncomfortably.

"I know, sir. It's fine."

But it wasn't, they knew it and they both knew there was more to it than him hating parties. Jack chewed on the inside of his mouth. Carter deserved more. Hadn't he said that to Daniel a few days ago? Hadn't he meant it?

"No…" he breathed, moving over to her again, noticing her uneasiness the closer he got. "It's not," he breathed, finally resting just before her. She gazed, somewhat startled, at him. "We both know my mood has nothing to do with parties and more to do with a particular woman than several scantily clad ones."

"Sir-"

His hand flew up and waved at her. "Carter." She silenced, exhaling in what she could only decide was shock. "I need you to be happy," he told her, his eyes not asking but commanding she look at him. "That's all."

His eyes seemed to get blacker the longer she stared into them. Her lips parted, unsure of what to say… of what he was saying. He rushed a grimace, obviously waiting for her to respond. She felt the need to alleviate his worries. Tell him you're happy, she prompted her vocal cords. With Pete, an afterthought. She moistened her lips as if she would speak.

"It's taken me a while, but I've figured it out and I promise to stop being such a pain in the ass," he jumped in before her, suddenly not wanting to hear what she would say.

She nodded and cast her eyes away. He didn't want to tell her he had spent his days of 'resident-pain-in-the-ass' not as someone who was concerned for her happiness but someone who was being destroyed because of it. And now he realised he was just going to have to suck it all up. He needed her. Even with a fiancée in tow and she didn't need this. There was nothing else to it, it didn't matter that he loved her, or that it hurt like hell to finally realise he could never so much as tell her that.

Carter thought she knew what he was saying and yet... something wasn't ... fitting.

"Sir, I…" she faltered, her voice weaker than she had expected. His brow furrowed at her and she swallowed, hard. God, what did she want to say? Whatever was playing on her tongue wasn't too damn sure it should be unleashed. "I-"

"Hey!"

Their heads whisked around and Jack coughed when he saw Pete in the doorway, Daniel bobbing behind him. Tension seemed to engulf them, bouncing like raw energy off the three of them and crackling in the deafening silence, unable to settle.

"Pete," she croaked. His eyes flashed so quickly she wasn't sure she saw it, then, "Got away early. I called…" he paused to wrap his arm around her waist and plant a kiss on her cheek. "Daniel said there was a party."

As Sam thawed a little, Jack's eyes found Daniel watching him intently, a smile playing in his eyes that was tickling its way down to his lips. Jack made a mental note to kill him later.

"Did I miss anything?" Pete asked and Daniel stepped forward with an arm stretched out.

"Ah… I saved you some grub," Daniel motioned and Pete, reluctantly, with a glance at Sam and a badly hidden one at Jack, followed the plotting archaeologist outside. Their sudden absence left plenty of room for a merciless silence to return. Jack shifted on his feet, hands in pockets, blinking at Sam and half hoping she would finish the sentence Pete had interrupted.

She opened her mouth, "Cake?" She had finally succumbed to the discomfiture of being underneath his intense eyes and borrowed a tactic of his own to divert from the tense situation.

"Oh yes!" He exclaimed rubbing his hands together in glee, gladly taking the out she presented.

"You did not inform the Colonel that PeteShannahan called," Teal'c observed as he watched the way Daniel was paying avid attention to O'Neill and Carter.

Daniel was mauling a particularly large piece of cake and beaming at the light mood that his two friends were sharing. The only inclination that he had heard Teal'c was a brief eyebrow shooting up and down again.

Whatever Jack had said – in what Daniel could only assume was a makeshift apology – had broken down the wall that he had erected between himself and Sam. Daniel wasn't the only one to notice something distinctive between the two soldiers, as Pete re-entered the room with a plate of cake Daniel fought to hold back a smirk as Pete's eyes drifted to the pair who were conversing rather comfortably across the room. Comfortably wasn't a word Pete might have used given the option to describe it and Daniel did feel a pang of guilt as he saw anxiety worm it's way into his eyes while he took a seat beside Daniel.

Daniel heard Sam laugh and glanced across to her again. "Fresh air cannot make your brain sting, sir."

"Can so!"

"'Fraid not," she shook her head, laughing and poking at her cake with a fork.

"Carter, I don't like knowing you're wrong, most of the time it would make me nervous but I'm telling you – you're wrong!"

"When have you ever known I was wrong?" She leaned her head to look at him expectantly with a grin plastered on her face. His mouth opened and she could almost see him thinking. He cleared his throat and scowled at her, muttering something under his breath that only served to make her laugh.

"I don't know why you like these…" Jack grumbled, stabbing one of the letters that had fallen from his icing and lifting it onto his fork. He raised an eyebrow and her plate was beside his immediately as he shook the offending sugary thing off onto her plate and she scraped off the icing from around her sponge cake onto his plate, swapping him.

"Much better than the icing," Carter said absently as she pulled her plate back to indulge.

His mouth was full but that didn't stop him from disagreeing. "Sooo wrong, Carter," he drawled, his tongue tackling with the mouthful of cake, shaking his head at her.

Carter bowed her head and laughed softly, back to enjoying her own cake, the way she liked it.

Daniel glanced at Teal'c who already had his eyebrow in its customary position in moments like this. They had seen this scene many times before. Since the first time the team had shared cake, Jack and Sam always did this and now after so long it was mostly just habitual but a lot of the time seeing it made something stir inside Daniel and as he eyed Pete, something was definitely stirring inside him.

No idea where this is going... should be fun. Feedback?