"Has anyone ever told you you eat like a bird?"
Captain Carter glanced at her tray, vacant but for a bowl of salad and a parfait cup of blue jello, then over to her commanding officer's heaping one – mashed potatoes, the mystery meat he must have gotten used to over the years, pie... the works. "Has anyone ever told you that some birds eat up to their entire body weight in a day?" She let that sink in for half a second before prompting, hoping to catch him off guard, "Are you calling me fat, sir?"
That question had never failed to make a man stutter (and usually apologize), but he didn't take the bait. Adopting that same overly confident smile from their first run-in in the conference room, he let his eyes roam casually from the tips of her toes ever so slowly up to her eyes. "Oh, I would never."
She couldn't hold his gaze or control the tiny smile that tugged the corners of her lips at that. What the hell was wrong with her? She'd spent half her time around him fighting to prove that she could be his equal, yet one searing look from him could set her heart all a-flutter and make her knees just a little weak.
He was dangerous. Ex-Black Ops, a little jaded toward life, older than she was... not to mention tall, dark, and handsome. Exactly her type.
She fought hard to remind herself as he led the way through the cafeteria tables that her type had a history of not working out. She needed a new type. Badly.
The twelve newest members of the SGC – SG teams seven, eight, and nine – all sat together in the far corner. Sam could understand that; they'd spent three weeks in training together and had probably already bonded to some degree, whereas they knew almost no one on the base. Daniel's idea was seeming better and better by the minute for both their sakes – it would set the newbies at ease, and she could get a look at the fresh meat.
God, the colonel had her acting like some hormonal teenager. Seriously, Carter, pull yourself together, she scolded, mentally giving herself a good, swift kick.
The colonel reached them first, and Daniel moved to her other side. "Fellas," Colonel O'Neill greeted. "Mind if we join you?"
All twelve looked up at his voice, the six nearest them swinging around in their chairs to get a look.
And one all-too-familiar pair of blue eyes shifted straight past him to level on her.
She wasn't even aware that the tray had slipped from her fingers until it clattered to the floor. The sound of shattering china broke her shock – or gave her an excuse, she wasn't sure which – and she dropped to her knees, gingerly collecting the pieces of her plate and putting them back on the tray with trembling fingers. She was well aware of the fourteen sets of eyes on the top of her head, but only one mattered. And she could not look up.
An airman appeared with a hand broom all too soon and slid the still-intact tray away from the rest of the mess. "I've got it, ma'am."
"I'm sorry. I'm such a klutz," she breathed, her voice shaking more than she would have liked.
"Really, ma'am, it's okay," the airman insisted. "I've got it."
With a jerky nod, she got to her feet, keeping her head down until she'd managed to spin a complete one-eighty. She would not run, no, but her best power-walk carted her straight for the door.
"Sam?" Daniel called after her. "Sam, aren't you gonna eat?"
Ignoring him completely, she shoved her way out of the cafeteria and fled.