a/n: I meant to post this two days ago, but I've been super busy with very little computer time, sorry. Hopefully, I'll be able to post the next chapter first thing Monday. Also, I didn't get to proofread this, so ignore any mistakes. I'll go over it Monday and fix any mistakes I find. Thanks.

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Jack smiled warmly at the pretty woman sitting in front of him and sipped his coffee. She was going on and on about Julie and Jake and Jack was enjoying hearing the stories about his son and his friend.

Carol was……gorgeous. It had been so, so long since Jack had been in the company of a clean, well-groomed, attractive woman. The few females on his planet were already mated and were completely unattractive to Jack. Coming from earth, Jack was used to woman who showered everyday and brushed their hair often. The women on his new planet, well, they were a bit more primitive.

Jack glanced at Carol's well-manicured and polished fingernails as she held her Styrofoam cup in her hand. It felt so good to be around an earth-woman again, to feel his body reacting in the natural way it was supposed to. He had been practically celibate the last few years. Sure, he got urges, and normally he took care of them himself. However, every so often, he just couldn't deny his body the feel of a woman.

That's when he would return to Edora and visit Laira. Yeah, he felt guilty about it. He was using her, and she knew it. He also knew that she felt guilty about taking away his former life, and out of that guilt, she happily welcomed him to her bed.

He would please her, and take away some of her guilt, even if just for the moment. And, she would please him and relieve the tension he desperately needed released. But, afterwards, when he dressed and told her good-bye, the guilt, it always took back over. It wasn't how it was supposed to be. It was never how it was supposed to be.

Jack never should have left earth.

Carol said something to him and batted her eyelashes and Jack grinned at her obvious flirtation. He shifted closer to her and started flirting back, the familiar excitement of coming on to a woman and having her return the affection filled his body. This was great! It had been so long since he flirted with a woman. And, he missed it.

He missed walking up behind Carter and whispering something silly in her ear before a mission. He missed brushing her bangs out of her face after a tough practice fight in the gym where they both ended up out-of-breath and sweaty. He missed watching her during debriefings, and then quickly looking away when she caught him. He missed teasing her mercilessly about all the men she had at her beckon call. He missed……….

He missed Carter.

He looked back up at the woman in front of him, still blissfully going on about something or other. She wasn't Carter. She never would be. And even if Carter was gone, he still hadn't resolved that part of his life. He had a son, with a woman he had loved, and now he needed to come to terms with what Carter was to him so that he could find closure, so that Jake could find closure, and they both could finally move on.

"Uh, Carol," he cut in, his voice raspy from his sudden onslaught of emotion.

Carol stopped talking and cocked her head at Jack, a gesture silently telling him to go on.

"This has been nice, but I really need to get back."

"Oh, okay. Well, I'm sure, uhm, we can do this again, right?" she asked, a hopeful look on her face.

Jack swept the end of his tongue out to run along his bottom lip. "I'd love to," he told her, and keeping eye contact, continued, "as friends."

Carol bit down on the insides of her mouth. "Friends?" she repeated, a dejected look crossing her pretty face.

Jack nodded.

"Because of Sam?" she asked in a quiet voice, her eyes full of curiosity.

Jack looked away quickly and then built up the courage to look back at her. He nodded again, his eyes staying glued on the floor. "Yeah."

Carol nodded in disappointed understanding. "You did love her?"

Jack's head shot back up in surprise. Why would she even assume that he hadn't? For crying out loud, they had a son together! Of course he loved her! He wouldn't just have a child with anyone………

Except, that's exactly what he had thought he had done with Laira. He knew he wasn't in love with her when he slept with her.

He had thought he was stranded on Edora, and he had been devastated. When Laira had asked him to give her a child, the thought of being a father again was the only thing he could think of that could bring him out of the despair he felt. And so, he had done it, just the once. But, then again, he had only slept with Carter once, too.

But the difference in the two nights was immensely vast in Jack's eyes. With Laira, he had been drunk, and depressed. And, he was trying to get over his despair and accept the new life he had been stuck with. But, with Carter…… With Carter, he had been in love. He knew it would only be the one time, he knew he was leaving the woman he truly loved behind, but he just couldn't leave her without showing her how much she truly meant to him. Where with Laira, it had merely been about repressing his demons in a drunken night of fornication, with Carter, it had been about making love to the woman he cared about most in the universe.

With Carter, it hadn't been about repressing his demons, it had been about freeing them.

He wouldn't change his night with Carter for the world.

With a sad, soft voice, Jack replied. "I've loved her for a very long time."

And then he saw the one thing on her face that he hated seeing aimed at him.

Pity.

He watched her lick her lips and give him a small smile. "She loved you too. She never stopped."

A hard lump formed in Jack's throat, and he fought to breathe around it. He sized up the woman in front of him, taking in her words, squinting his intense dark eyes at her. Just when she was sure she was going to start to fidget under his gaze, she heard his deep, throaty whisper. "Thank you."

She nodded at him. "We should probably go," she hoarsely got out.

And Jack agreed whole-heartedly.

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Jake came home from school in a bad mood. He threw his bag on the floor and then sulked on the couch, glaring at anyone who entered the den.

Cassie had taken over for Daniel that afternoon, and both she and Jack gave each other perplexed looks at Jake's behavior.

"You alright, Jake?" Jack asked from just outside the den, not wanting to enter it after Cassie had done so and been screamed at by the five-year old.

"I'm fine, go away."

Jack pursed his lips together, but did not move. "Why don't you tell me what's wrong?"

"Cuz I don't want to," Jake replied icily.

"It might make you feel better if you do."

"It might make YOU feel better," Jake snarled.

"And what is that supposed to mean?" Jack asked defensively.

Jake jumped off the couch, walked over to Jack at the door, and punched him as hard as he could in the stomach.

Jack arched forward, a bit in surprise, and a bit in pain. The boy had a good arm.

"What the hell was that for?" Jack barked.

"For leaving my mom!" Jake screamed and then ran out of the house.

"Jake!" Cassie yelled, chasing him out the door. When she saw him run up and into Julie's house, she knew he would be safe, and she turned to check on Jack. "Are you okay?"

Jack nodded, still clutching his stomach with a shocked look on his face. "I guess I deserved that."

Cassie shook her head. "He doesn't know, Jack. He had no idea about what went on back then. Sam would never tell him anything. Only that you lived far away and that you both made him out of love."

Cassie's words washed over Jack. Knowing that Carter felt the same amount of love that night that he did, comforted and hurt him at the same time. He never should have left. He never should have let Laira leave the SGC without an ultrasound. He never should have left Carter behind.

He deserved the punch his son had given him……..and so much more.

When the phone rang a few minutes later, Cassie walked over and picked it up, already assuming it was Carol calling about Jake.

Jack wandered around the house aimlessly while Cassie talked on the phone. Without realizing where he was going, Jack found himself in front of Carter's bedroom door. Sucking in a deep, trembling breath. Jack turned the knob and pushed open the door.

The room was surprisingly bright, with the sun shining brightly in the large window with the curtains pulled back. Her bed was made neatly and her dresser and nightstand held several frames of photos. Jack walked over and sat on her desk, his eyes immediately taking in the baby picture of Jake sitting next to her alarm clock on the bedside table.

Jake looked to only be a few months old. He was on his stomach, looking up at the camera with a drooling smile on his face. He was completely naked except for a scrap of long, white fabric that was stretched over his butt. Jack smiled warmly at the picture, trying to imagine what Jake must have been like as an infant. Immediately, an image of Sam, holding a newborn baby and smiling lovingly at him popped in his head, and Jack felt the biggest amount of regret yet.

Sighing, Jack glanced at the other photos on the dresser. Many of them were photos he had seen before. Pictures of Sam and Mark as kids. Pictures of Sam's parents. A photo of Jacob in his tok'ra gear. There were also a few new ones of the gang. A few with Jake in them. A large photo caught Jack's attention, and he knew he wanted a copy of it.

It was Sam and Jake, and it looked to be pretty recent. Jack jumped off the bed and walked over and picked up the frame. Sam and Jake were smiling at the camera. Jake looked to be sitting on her lap, with his back against her front. Sam looked beautiful, just like always. Her hair was still short, her eyes were still bright, and Jack's heart still skipped a beat as he looked at her.

He was still holding the picture when Cassie walked cautiously in the room. She looked around sadly, and Jack remembered that no one had been in the room since Carter's death.

"That was Julie's mom. She says that Jake's calming down at her house. Julie told her that Chase and some older kids were teasing Jake on the playground today at school telling him that his dad only came to town because his mom died and that you never wanted anything to do with him or his mom."

"Damn it," Jack hissed. "I'm really starting to hate this Chase kid."

Cassie nodded. "Me too."

"Do I need to go get him?"

Cassie shook her head. "No, he's pretty mad at you right now. I think it's best if we let him spend the night with Julie. Carol already said it was okay, and I can run some clothes down there for him for school tomorrow."

Jack nodded and scrubbed his hands over his face and hair. Looking back up, he glanced around the room and then met Cassie's eyes. "We need to start going through this stuff soon."

Cassie swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded. "Yeah, I'm just not ready yet," she told the man, her eyes filling with unshed tears.

Jack nodded somberly back at her. He wasn't ready either.

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Laira dipped the cloth in the cool water and dabbed it on Major Carter's face and forehead again. She sighed deeply, taking in the unconscious woman before her. The doctor had left only minutes ago, ordering Laira to keep vigil over the patient for the night. Her injuries were severe, and the Edoran medicine was no where near advanced enough to heal the earth woman. They were doing all they could to keep the warrior stable, but until Jack returned and took her to a more advanced culture, Major Carter was on her own at healing her injuries.

Laira looked up when two men entered the room. "Garan, where is Jack?" she asked, expecting to see the colonel with them.

"He was not there. His people said two men came through their stargate and took him back to earth yesterday. Jack said he would get in touch with them soon, but until then, they have no way of contacting him."

Laira closed her eyes and sighed. Daniel and Teal'c.

She had completely forgotten about their visit the day before. She should have known Jack would return to earth with them.

It looked like Major Carter was on her own to heal.

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a/n: Carter is a colonel now, but Laira doesn't know that, so she refers to her as Major Carter. Just FYI in case anyone caught on to the rank change.