Completely blown away by the response on Chapter 13, that I pushed hard to get this out quickly. Short, but that's because I had to cut it in order to focus on the emotions between these two. Thank you so much for your wonderful reviews, which gave me so much insight on how you guys are taking the different turns this story is taking.

Chapter 14: Say I Love You When You're Not Listening

Sam felt Jack's hold on her slacken the moment she'd stopped struggling, even as his mouth remained close to her ear, the skin of her neck and the whole of her back feeling every inhale and exhale he took.

For a moment, she leaned against him, savouring his closeness despite fearing the anger that was emanating from him. He may have startled her, but he'd been gentle in the way he'd subdued her. She'd seen seen him in action, knew just how many ways he could hurt a person, and if he'd wanted to harm her he could've easily done so. She may have not liked his method of getting her attention, but she hadn't once felt fear. Despite all their issues, she would always, always trust him with her life.

Jack took hold of her shoulders and spun her around to face him. It was the first time in what felt like years that he'd been so physically close.

"I asked you a question, Carter."

"Jack-" she begun, but he interrupted her with a raised eyebrow.

"That would be 'General O'Neill' or 'Sir', Carter," he said, emphasizing his title and rank.

She hardened her expression, raising her own eyebrows insolently. "That's how you're going to play it? Hide behind ranks."

His mouth tightened at her insubordinate remark. "You've crossed a line, Colonel. I'd advise you to move back behind it before you make things worse."

She gave out a humorless laugh. "Worse how? Worse than the way you've been treating me these past few months? Worse than being told that I can't see my alternate's daughter when everyone else on my team has had the pleasure?" she spat out. She paused, glaring at him. "Why don't you just dial up Netu, send me through and have it done with? Maybe that'll make you feel better knowing that I'm not just proverbially in hell but physically in it!" she sobbed out.

Jack looked down at his hands that were holding her, and immediately released her shoulders. "Goddammit, Carter…" he swore turning away from her.

"I'm tired of this, Jack," she deliberately said his name. "I wanna know what I did that was so horrible that you felt like you had to end years of friendship and respect… Why you won't let me see my own daughter!"

"Fer crying out loud, Carter," he glanced sideways, towards the playground. She watched him hesitate for a second, before grabbing her hand and pulling her the opposite direction of the play area, further towards the lake's edge.

He pulled her along until they were far enough away from the playground, letting go of her hand before he started speaking.

"Carter," he said her name, this time, far more in control. "Let's get one thing clear," he said raising a finger. "You did nothing wrong. This whole thing with Samantha…" he shook his head. "That was my fuckup. It was a misjudgement on my part. I knew what she was doing, knew she was exploiting what attraction I had for you at the time, and instead of being the stronger person, I took the easy way out and gave her what she wanted. It was a pity fuck, what I can say?"

Sam flinched at his use of the crude term.

"I'm not proud of my actions, Sam," The use of her first name startled her. When they'd spoken back in the outpost, not once did he use her name. "But I'm telling you right now, what happened between me and her at the time had nothing to do with you. When I was with her, I wasn't living out some perverted fantasy I had about my 2IC, I was trying to comfort a woman who desperately wanted something only I could give…" he shook his head again. "I genuinely thought that no one would get hurt," he grimaced. "I guess knowing my track record for screwing up the lives of those closest to me should have clued me in."

Her mouth automatically opened to defend him, but he stopped her. "Let me finish this. Let me finish before I change my mind."

She nodded wordlessly. She desperately wanted to hear what he was going to say. This was probably the last time she would get any sort of explanation from him before he regained his senses and reverted them back to their military roles.

"As for my respect, you'll always have that. There's nothing you can do that would make me feel any different. But as for our being friends, if you want me to be entirely honest, then you'll have to admit to yourself that was always impossible between us."

She recoiled in denial. Of course they'd been friends! All those times he'd teased her, all those times they'd hang out as a team, surely that had to mean something to him? "So I was always just your second in command…" she moved away, not even attempting to conceal the hurt his words was inflicting on her.

Jack stepped in front of her and tilted her chin up to meet his gaze. She sucked in a shaky breath and forced herself to look at him, no matter how painful.

"That's just the thing, Sam. You were never just my second in command. My feelings for you were always complicated. There was always something between us that made it damned hard to be just friends. I think you've known that all along, that's why you never came up to the cabin-"

"Because I knew it would only take a moment of weakness on my part," she finished for him, finally confessing the weight of her feelings after all these years. "I knew it wouldn't be you breaking the regs, it would be me, and I couldn't risk our work like that. It was far too important at the time."

"And it's still important now," he replied back. "Nothing has changed. If anything, there's even more on the line today than there was back then. We've started something out there," he referred to their work vaguely, knowing that they were in a public place, "and we have a duty to see it through."

"So, we're back to square one," she said bitterly. "Except this time I'll be under no illusion of ever having had your friendship."

His eyes hardened for a moment, but he worked hard to push it down. He looked towards the lake, visibly struggling with something in his mind, some decision, and only when he'd come to a conclusion did he look back at her again.

"You seem very convinced that I'm doing all this to deliberately hurt you," he said in a measured tone.

"Aren't you?" she retorted back.

He visibly flinched at her words, and Sam felt a bit of satisfaction from his pain. Good. It was his turn to feel some of the hurt.

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe, just maybe I was hurting too?" This time when he looked at her with his deep brown eyes, he let his ever-impenetrable shields go down, and allowed her to see the pain lurking behind the bluster and fury he always exuded around people.

"There was always a part of me that hoped against all odds that we'd get a shot at something in the future. That if I fought hard enough, killed enough snakes, that I'd get a break - maybe even an injury good enough to retire me - and finally get a chance with you. I still held on to that hope even after you started humming…"

For a moment, his comment confused her, but then realization set in. Oh.

"But then Thor did this," he pointed to his face. "And I got this," he pointed to the star on his green collar. "And you agreed to wear that," he indicated the ring on her left hand. "It was then that I decided that enough was enough, that I had to get over this hoping and move on with my life just as you had," he told her sadly. "To do that, I had to keep my distance. That may seem like I'm punishing you for something that you had no control over, but I saw no other way to do it. To keep you close to me-" he paused shaking his head. "I was always faithful to the vows I made to Sara. Right to the very end. You might not have taken those vows yourself yet, but I respect that you've made a promise to someone else, and I refuse to want another man's wife."

Sam gasped when Jack held one side of her face with his hand. He looked down at her, so close, enough that if she just tilted her head to one side-

"I'm not trying to hurt you, Carter, please believe me," he said in a softly pleading voice she swore she'd never heard him use before. It was almost desperate, almost pitiful, that it went against everything she knew of Jack O'Neill. Even at their worst times off-world, during torture sessions, at pain of death, she'd never heard him plead for leniency. Never heard him plead for his life. He was pleading with her now.

"All I'm asking is that you give me the space I need to finally let you go," he said to her quietly, pain evident in his expression. He let his hand drop, and she suddenly felt cold as he took a step away from her.

Everything inside her reeled at his request. No, no, no! This wasn't what she wanted. She didn't want to give him space, not when he'd finally opened up to her!

"And I'm asking you to stay away from Grace," he said to her in a firmer voice.

That snapped her out of her inner dialogue. "What?"

He chose his words carefully before explaining. "She's four years old, Sam. She tells me her mommy went to live in heaven to take care of her grandpa and grandma and her other daddy. It took a while, but Janet tells me that she's only now stopped asking why Samantha couldn't stay and take care of her instead."

A fresh deluge of tears stained her cheeks at hearing of Grace's loss.

"She's finally getting some normality in her life," Jack informed her. "The last thing I want is to open up more hurt, to lose another person she's grown attached to," he said with a knowing look.

"What makes you think that she'd lose me?"

"You're on the front lines, Carter. SG-1 does dangerous work. But more immediately, you're about to get married. How do I explain to a four year old how mommy can only come visit once and a while? How do you explain her to your cop when he starts asking questions about why you seem to spend so much time visiting your CO's house? I can't keep making exceptions in your case, Carter. None of the other team leaders have had the luxury of having their spouse told what they do in the mountain. They know better than to ask or force the matter by snooping around."

For the first time, Sam saw just how much Pete's interference in the Osiris op had pissed off Jack. He'd been understanding at the time, but she sensed that he'd had to really rein in his temper to not show his frustration. If it had been anyone else, anyone within the SGC, they would've found themselves sitting in the brig for days.

"So just because I've chosen to have a life with someone, I'm automatically barred from seeing my kid? Is that what this is really about?" she asked him spitefully.

Jack's expression suddenly shuttered. "We're done here," he said without inflection. He made to walk away, but her hand shot out and grabbed his arm.

"No! There's no way we're even close to done."

He worked his jaw, then looked down at her hold on him. If he truly wanted to shrug her off, he was more than capable of it. He'd demonstrated just how much physically stronger he was when he'd dragged her deeper into the cover of trees earlier.

Sam dropped her hand. Jack shook his head in frustration. "You know, Carter," he said slowly and pointedly. "The fact that you think I'm being deliberately vindictive towards you for choosing someone else says a whole lot about how much you actually know me."

"That's not-"

"Just let me finish," he interrupted her. "Let me say what I need to and we can finally end this once and for all." He took her hand into his once again and pulled her along until they were by an empty park bench that overlooked the small lake.

He gestured for her to sit before following her example. "I'm getting too old for this crap, Sam. I've done the whole family thing. Me and Sara… we were the best. I loved her with everything in me, but shit happens and circumstances change. You've got a shot at starting a new life without all the baggage that being with me would carry. As much as-" he paused to take a breath - "as much as it hurts to see you with Pete, what matters is that he makes you happy. Despite what you might think of me, what a completely and utter bastard you think I am, I genuinely wish you the best."

He looked at her sadly. "I'm not keeping my daughter away from you because of some misguided attempt to get back at you. I wish you didn't think so little of me…" he waved off her attempt to speak. "I'm doing it because I know what it's like to fail a child so horribly that no amount of time or repentance could ever make up for it. As much as you want this to be about you, it really isn't. This is me protecting my family. My daughter, Sam, not yours."

She felt the sting of his words hit her directly in the chest. Not yours. His family, not yours.

Not theirs.

"We can tell her the truth," Sam persisted. She searched her genius mind for a solution. "We can tell her I'm not really her mom, that I'm some relative, something, anything!" she pleaded with him.

Jack let out a defeated sigh. "I'm not going through this with you again, Sam. I've told you my reasons and I need you to accept them."

He rose up and walked towards the water's edge. Sam studied his stiff back, hands shoved into his BDU pockets. She briefly wondered why he still wore his uniform outside the base, before her thoughts went back to the words he'd said to her.

"What did you mean when you said that we can end 'this' once and for all?" she asked him after a beat, half dreading his answer. Jack stood there for a moment not saying anything. She watched him patiently as he seemed to debate with himself, so far from the confident and decisive commander she was familiar with.

When he finally turned back to look at her, she saw the resolve on his face and felt her insides constrict in dismay.

"I'm saying that I'm done. This," he motioned between them, "has to stop. No more feeling feelings, no more caring for you a lot more than I'm supposed to," he reminded her of the words he'd said to her while strapped to a za'tarc detector and on P3R-118 where he'd revealed his deep affection for her as Jonah. God she'd fallen so deeply for him imprisoned in that frozen hell hole. Amidst the dirt and the grime, he'd been her one bright spot in the darkness.

She met his gaze with her watery eyes, her cornflower iris glistening with tears. "You can turn your feelings off that easily?"

He grimaced at her question, then replied, "Who said it would be easy?"

She forced herself to stand on shaking legs. Despite the cool breeze coming off the lake, she felt the sweat under her shirt. This was it. This was her last chance to lay it all on the table. If she didn't tell him how she really felt, he would be lost to her, and- "What about Grace?" she blurted out before she could stop herself. The desperation inside her still clamored for some sort of relief. She needed to know Grace.

"You know where I stand-"

"Please, Jack," she whispered softly. "Please. Promise me at least that one day, when she's older, when she can better understand…"

He agreed wordlessly. Out of the blue, he pulled her into his arms, enfolding her into a hug. She closed her eyes, feeling his hot breath as he buried his face into crook of her neck. "I think I'll always love you, Sam," he quietly said, his mouth moving against the collar of her shirt.

She sobbed loudly, her body shaking, her heart breaking at the resigned way he finally spoke the words she'd always wanted to hear. This wasn't at all how she'd imagined it.

Without warning, he pulled away. Her eyes were blurry from tears and she felt rather than saw him leave. She collapsed on the park bench, unable to stop shaking. She had so much to say, but he hadn't given her a chance. His declaration of love had blindsided her that she'd been unable to tell him that she reciprocated his feelings.

He'd just walked away…

Jack pulled out his cell phone and quickly texted Cassie that he was coming home. As much as he wanted to spend some time with Gracie, he needed a few minutes to himself to properly digest what had gone down with him and Carter.

He'd finally gone for broke and confessed his feelings for her. It was his ultimate act on his way to finally letting go of her. It had hurt like hell, just like he'd anticipated. It had hurt more. To hold her in his arms as the man who loved her, but only to say goodbye.

He'd done it though. As much as it had pained him and ripped out his insides, at least he'd done it with some shred of dignity, however tattered that dignity was. Someday he could look back at that moment, and know he'd said it to her without any possible doubts as to his meaning.

I hope this explained a bit more about Jack's motivation and his reasoning for not wanting Sam to meet Grace. If not, let me know, I'll keep working on it... or at least tell the story better. Let me know if this at least mellowed your feelings toward both Jack and Sam. Did you at least feel the love?

REVIEW RESPONSE (FOR GUEST REVIEWERS)

Thank you Kim, EAC, and All the Guest reviewers.

Kahuna: I agree with you 100%. You seem to read my mind! I should get you to write this! LOL Sorry for the delay with PD. Half done at the moment, admittedly bcs of this fic. I suck =(

Mercy: They're just friends in this fic ;-) But, hey, Rule 34!

Carrie: I'm glad the characters are really coming to life for you. My constant fear is that I'll bore you all to death. Jack's is not trying to be an ass in this particular instance. He genuinely just wants to protect Grace.