Jack awoke to the sound of his alarm clock for the first time in a while and he decided he preferred waking naturally and that retirement was sounding better and better. Then he remembered why he was waking up to an alarm clock and he searched the bed for Sam. He found her curled up in a ball on the other side of the bed looking chilled. He felt bad, suddenly, because she'd gone to sleep the night before on top of the blankets, he was sure because she didn't want to make him uncomfortable. Add that to the fact that she'd slept in her jeans and he was feeling like a down right heel.
He'd wanted her to stay. He just hadn't really known how to ask her. Hadn't known how to tell her he wanted her in his bed. Hadn't known how to tell her he wanted it but was scared of it at the same time. So when she'd offered to stay the night and had said she wasn't changing because she didn't want him to talk her out of it, he'd taken her at face value knowing that was exactly what he'd have done.
Except now she didn't look very comfortable. And something about her curled up over there left him feeling off-center.
The sound of his alarm must have filtered into her sleep because she began to rouse. He smacked at the alarm until it turned off and then he rolled back over until he was hovering over her slightly. She rolled over onto her back and found him looking at her. "Good morning," she said sleepily.
"Morning."
"Did you sleep?"
"Some. The alarm woke me."
"Good."
He flopped onto his back and reached out and grabbed her, hauling her to him until she was sprawled over him much as she had started out the night before. "Good morning," she said again, with a giggle.
"It helps, you being here."
She sobered instantly and smoothed her hand across his chest. "I'm glad."
"Stay tonight?"
"Okay," she said simply.
He wasn't sure what he expected but it wasn't easy acquiescence. He kind of thought he was going to have to convince her. But then he remembered, this was Sam, his teammate, someone who truly understood him. He didn't have to explain or wonder if she understood, because she did. She just... did. "Thanks."
"But now I have to get up and go home to get ready for work."
"Are you at least going to kiss me good morning?" he asked, teasingly.
"Are you at least going to let me brush my teeth?" she answered back.
He groaned. "All right, all right." He pushed himself up out of bed, jostling her in the process. In his bathroom he unearthed a brand new toothbrush for her and they stood side by side brushing their teeth, exchanging glances in the mirror. When they were done, he barely let her dry her face before he took her in his arms. "Better?"
"Much."
"Now you'll kiss me?"
"Now I'll kiss you."
He grinned at her and leaned forward to capture her lips with his. It was a slow, soft, early morning kiss. It was mostly lips and a little tongue flicking against his straight, white teeth. It was her hands in his hair and his hands on her hips and their chests pressed together. It was their toes flirting with each other, hers in socks, his bare. When he'd had his fill of her mouth – when he needed a breath, he'd never have his fill of her mouth – he dipped his face into the crook of her neck and breathed in the warm scent of her that was overlaid with the scent of his bed and he decided he liked the smell of them together.
She wrapped her arms around his waist and they stood there for a while just holding one another until, finally, she told him, "I really have to go now."
"I know," he said into her skin before he pulled back to look into her blue, blue eyes.
"I'll come back. As soon as I'm done at the mountain."
"Make it an early day," he said and hoped it didn't sound too pleading, hoped he didn't sound too much like he needed her with him.
"I'll do my best," she said with a warm smile.
When she left he wandered around like a lost puppy for a while until, finally, he rolled his eyes at himself and kicked himself into gear. Sure, he missed her – he'd been with her for two and a half days straight – but he was a big boy and he could function without her around. Could function just fine, thank you very much.
He went out to the garage and got the lawn mower out. It took him a couple of hours to cut the grass and another couple to edge and weedeat the property. Another couple after that to trim the hedges. At some point he had stopped and run into town for a little lunch. By mid afternoon, though, he was done with his yard and he knew he had at least two and a half hours until she showed back up and he was feeling a little lost again.
He sat himself down and had a real hard think about what was going on. Why was he feeling so forlorn without Sam around? Was it because he'd had such an emotional weekend and she'd really been like a balm to his soul? Perhaps. It hadn't been an angry sort of weekend, though he'd had those moments, too. He'd railed at her at one point, simply because she'd been there. And she'd stood there and taken the brunt of his anger, then had wrapped him in her arms and kissed his temple and told him that she wasn't leaving while he trembled with anger. He'd feared himself in that moment but she hadn't feared him.
She trusted him implicitly and he didn't know if that was a good thing. In a way, it made him want to live up to that trust, but in another he knew he'd never be able to. He now lived in fear of being the one to bring death and destruction into her life. It was one of the main reasons he was retiring – to keep her and the rest of SG-1 safe. Or, safer, anyway. He was a liability now.
But still, she trusted him not to hurt her and he endeavored not to. He was terrified that he was going to do to her again what he'd already done, or worse. Having her sleep next to him was doing little more than tempting fate, but he was selfish and weak and having her next to him really did seem to help keep the demons at bay. Though, something about the way they'd woken up that morning niggled at the back of his head as not-quite-right, but he couldn't put his finger on it.
The dreams didn't come as readily the night before. Of course, sleep hadn't come very readily either. But he hadn't been sleeping much unless he was drunk anyway. Sober, he'd sleep just a few hours and the dreams, oh the dreams. But the night before they hadn't been heinous. They'd been more garden-variety bad and less Astarte-prison-torture bad. He hadn't woken up with his hand around her throat in any event. Hadn't woken up at all, save for the alarm.
He'd dreamed about Astarte's prison, about the girls who came and fed him and bathed him. He'd dreamed about the reality of his time in captivity rather than about the things he'd been made to remember via the Blood of Sokar. So the dreams, yes they'd been bad, but they hadn't been awful.
So, yes, having her around did seem to help and, yes, he was selfish enough to want her by his side even though it might not be the safest place for her. He'd exploit her trust in him, because it was what he needed. And she'd allow it because, again, it was what he needed. And she was very much about what he needed these days.
He wondered what she needed. She hadn't fully processed her killing of Astarte, he knew. She'd tamped it down so she wouldn't have to deal with it. But soon, she'd have to. He'd made a career of killing for a while and he knew what it did to the soul. Eventually, she'd have to reckon with it. He just hoped he'd be as helpful to her as she'd been to him. Would she turn to him when she needed? Or would she think he was capable of taking but not giving?
Was he capable of giving? He didn't really know. Did he have anything to give her besides the mess that was inside him? He hoped so. There was happiness still inside him. He'd been able to tap into it with her. Maybe, where that happiness resided also lived something helpful, something meaningful, something giving.
He was ruminating on that, standing in the kitchen, beer in hand, when she walked through his front door. "Jack?"
"In here," he called, readying himself to be confronted by the object of his thoughts. He'd turned a little maudlin in the hours he'd been thinking.
She appeared looking weary and that's when he realized it was dark outside. Far more hours had passed than he'd realized. He'd expected her back much earlier. "It's late," he said.
"I'm so sorry – gate trouble. I'd have called, but I was up to my elbows in dialing protocols. And the General was not having a good day."
"It's okay. I was going to cook dinner, but I got lost in thought."
She looked at him, concerned. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah," he brushed it off, "fine."
"I'm too tired to eat anyway," she said.
He frowned, "You have to eat." She wasn't going to be skipping any meals on his watch.
"All I want is a hot shower." That was when he noticed the overnight bag slung over her shoulder.
"Use my bathroom," he told her, unsure of the last time the spare bathroom had even been cleaned. "I'll order..."
She considered it for a moment, "Chinese?"
"Chinese," he said, as if it had been his idea all along.
"I won't be long."
"Take your time," he told her, both so that she could relax and also so that he could shake off the last of his mood. She was back, it was time to enjoy her.
While she showered he did order their food and tried not think of her in the shower. He was surprised to find himself drifting to thoughts of her, nude, water sluicing down her body. Those thoughts were far more sexual than he would have imagined himself capable of all things considered. But he was thinking them, nonetheless. Picturing her body, warm and pink, soft and pliant, slick and slippery.
She emerged from the back of the house just moments after dinner arrived, dressed once more in leggings and a long sleeve t-shirt, her wet hair hanging loosely around her head. He really, really liked that look on her. It reminded him of that afternoon at her house when he'd stopped by and things between them had begun to change.
"Feel better?"
"Yes, I do. And I'm actually hungry now."
"Good. Because I ordered enough food to feed Teal'c. Force of habit." And a little bit in hopes of enticing her to eat more than she might usually. He was really beginning to notice that she was significantly thinner than he really remembered her being.
She laughed. It made him smile.
And like a ton of bricks it hit him why he'd felt off kilter earlier when they'd woken up and then later when he thought about it. The timing was weird, but he couldn't help it. The first morning when he'd gone out and woken her up from where she'd spent the night on his couch he'd found her cuddling his throw pillow. He'd determined her to be a cuddler. Then, he wakes up with her in bed, curled up on the opposite side of things by herself. Why hadn't he awoken with Carter cuddled up to him? Had he done something to her in the night?
"Sam?"
"Yeah?" she asked him, already pulling takeout containers out of the paper bag they were delivered in.
"Did you sleep okay last night?"
"Yeah. Why?"
"I didn't hurt you?"
"No. Why?"
"You were about as far from me on the bed as you could get this morning."
"Oh," she said quietly, "that."
"Yeah. That."
"I was afraid of doing something that would make you uncomfortable. I didn't want to be the cause of a flashback or a nightmare."
"But... I laid awake for hours and you were with me the whole time. I went to sleep sometime, and when I woke up you were gone. Are you sure I didn't do anything to you?"
She bit her lip and stopped pulling boxes out of the bag. "You were mumbling in your sleep. You said 'no' and 'stop'."
"I was dreaming about them bathing me," he confessed. "It wasn't about you touching me."
"I just want to do the right thing."
"Even I don't know what the right thing is, Carter," he pointed out. "But I know it's not you on the wrong side of the bed."
"Are you a close sleeper, or do you just think I am?" she asked him.
"Well, I guess I am," he reckoned. "But you are, too. I saw you with the pillow on the couch..."
"The pillow?"
"You were holding the pillow to you..."
She blushed prettily. "Probably because it smelled like you. I don't need to be all over you if I'm in your bed."
"I like you being close."
"As long as it's not pushing you too far too fast."
"It's not."
"Okay."
"Let's eat," he said, clapping his hands together.
He was pleased with the amount of food she put on her plate but not with the amount she actually ate but he couldn't bring himself to say anything to her about it. He just ate the last of the sweet and sour chicken off her plate with his fork while she picked at the mixed vegetables with her chopsticks.
Soon after dinner she was making little tired noises and he got the hint – it was time for bed. He walked through the house turning off lights and locking doors and met up with her in the master bathroom where she was already brushing her teeth. It made his stomach clench in the good way to have her there, in his bathroom, getting ready for bed. It reminded him of being married. He'd been really good at being married. And he'd enjoyed it. He was just a married kind of guy.
As she finished, he was rubbing his hand over his chin contemplating a shave before bed. If he waited until morning his beard would be long enough that it would be a pain in the ass, but if he shaved tonight, it would delay going to bed with her. Dilemmas dilemmas.
She turned, leaned one hip against the counter and gave him a serious look.
"What?"
"Thinking about shaving?" she asked him.
"Yeah..."
"Let me?"
"Let you?" Let her what? Then his eyes went wide with understanding. "Let you shave me?"
"Yes," she said, her voice nonchalant, her eyes anything but.
He considered her carefully for long moments. Thought about what it might be like to have her drag a razor across his skin. Did he trust her not to hurt him? Implicitly. That wasn't the problem at all. Could he manage the sensations without going back to the time and place of the last experience? Did he want to try to overwrite one experience with another? Yes, he decided. Yes, he did. "Okay."
"Yeah?"
He nodded once. He patted the counter next to the sink and she obediently hopped up into place. He stood in front of the sink. He got his razor out of the drawer and laid it on the counter next to her thigh. Next he pulled out a bottle of shaving oil and handed it to her then stood in front of her expectantly, his hands behind his back, a small smile playing about his lips.
She looked at the bottle dubiously. "What's this?"
"Shaving oil."
"Shaving oil?"
"Yep."
"So, this first?"
"Yep."
She looked at the bottle scientifically then turned it over and, he chuckled, read the instructions, before opening it and pouring a few drops into her palm. She rubbed her hands together and then reached for him and smoothed her hands over the stubbly portions of his face. Her hands were warm on his skin and she smelled like her underneath the cedarwood of the oil and it was already a completely different experience than he'd had on the planet.
After she was done with the oil he handed her a washcloth and she wiped her hands off. He took that washcloth and ran hot water over it. When it was nice and warm, he wrung it out and put it over his face, reveling in the warmth of the cloth. He kept his eyes fixed on her face, she watched him with big, wide eyes that were soft in the harsh lighting of the bathroom.
Next, he handed her a can of shaving cream. "You want me to do this part, too?" she asked, clearly a little amused.
"Yep."
"Okay," she said, a ghost of a smile on her face.
She sprayed some of the foam into her hand and then gently, very gently, began applying it to his face. When she was pleased enough with her handiwork he waited for her to rinse her hands in the sink before he filled it up with cool water for her to rinse the blade in.
She picked up the razor. He stepped forward so he was in between her knees, he could feel her pressing into his hips on either side. "Are you ready?" she asked quietly.
"Go ahead."
She swallowed, then nodded and started with his right cheek. It was an odd sensation, to feel the blade moving over his skin but to not be in control of it. He watched in the mirror as she made the stroke, then watched as she leaned over and rinsed the blade. She repeated her actions again and again. He rested his hands lightly on her thighs.
As she dragged the blade up his neck to his jaw he realized how intimate an act they were sharing. It was sensual, the rasp of the blade over his whiskers, her knees pressed into his hips, his hands on her, her breath on his face, her body so close to his, the trust he'd placed in her. He felt himself begin to harden. He hadn't expected that. He never expected it and it seemed to happen so easily with her. He made a sound in the back of his throat.
She jerked the razor away from him. "What? Did I cut you?"
He hummed. "No. Keep going." He sunk his fingers into the flesh of her thighs.
"You sure you're okay?"
"Yeah," he said gruffly.
She murmured her assent and set the blade back to his skin. As she worked he felt himself become more and more aroused by her closeness and what they were sharing. The feelings she was evoking in him were overshadowing his memories of the last time he'd been shaven. He could remember the other girls, the straight razor scraping along his neck, the feeling of dread he'd had despite their gentle, attentive nature. Sam was gentle and attentive, too.
She leaned over to rinse the razor again and he looked down at her, noticed her nipples hard against her t-shirt. Apparently the experience was getting to her as well. But instead of making him feel better, it opened a pit of panic in his belly. He had a sudden and very real flash to the last time this had happened to him and what had been expected of him next and he took a deliberate step back from her.
"Jack?" she asked, razor hanging in the air.
"Just, gimme a minute."
"Okay," she said soothingly, apparently keying in to his tone.
She didn't seem to care that she was turned on, he noticed. She wasn't conducting herself any differently. She certainly didn't seem to expect anything from him. Most importantly, she wasn't Astarte, and she'd never use him the way the other woman had. He took a step forward, back between her knees. "Okay."
She put her free hand on his waist. "You sure?"
"Yeah. I'm ready."
"All right." She continued on. But his arousal had been somewhat abated by his panic, which was nice. But, at the same time, he sort of missed the pleasurable feeling. It still didn't sit right with him, it still felt like something that didn't quite belong to him, but that didn't mean he didn't sort of like it. It was, after all, pleasure. It didn't just stop feeling good just because it wasn't yours to have anymore.
Sort of like how he'd kind of fudged things with Sam when he'd said the drugs Astarte gave him had made it so he didn't feel. It wasn't that he didn't feel, it was that he didn't feel what he needed to to make him come. But he found he couldn't talk in too much detail about it with her. Not yet. It was strange enough saying the word 'come' to her in that context without going into great detail about why he hadn't been able to. In truth, he'd been able to feel the pleasurable sensations of sex just fine, but the ultimate pleasure of release had been denied to him. And therein had been the lesson. He just didn't know how to tell her that.
He pulled his focus back to Sam and what she was doing. He wanted to get back to that soft, sort of sensual place he'd been and she still had half his face to go, so he thought it was possible that he could get there. She was certainly taking her time, being thorough and, most importantly, being careful and considerate. He watched her face as she made the next swipe of the razor. She held her bottom lip between her teeth in the most adorable way and it made him want to kiss her. He was finding a lot of things made him want to kiss her.
He concentrated on the feeling of the blade scraping across his skin. He looked into her blue eyes to find her completely focused on her task, her eyes fixed on the next swath of skin she was attacking. It felt a bit heady to be under that kind of scrutiny and, once more, he felt the latent arousal pick up. It wasn't the shaving, per se, he realized. It was her. It was being the object of her intense concentration. It was being her entire world for even a small span of time. To be everything to such an amazing person... he felt himself grow dizzy with the concept and, once more, he set his hands down on her thighs only this time for balance. He felt blood rush to his groin with his realization. It was sexy as all hell to be the locus of the mind of this woman.
He exhaled so roughly it ruffled her bangs. She blinked rapidly and shifted her eyes to his. "You okay? I'm almost done."
"I'm fine. This is just... more intense than I thought it would be."
"Yeah," she said softly, "me too."
Slowly, she finished the job. When she was done, she took the wet washcloth from before and wiped the remaining bits of shaving cream from his face, though she had been so thorough he could see in the mirror that there was hardly any at all. Still, he stood in front of her with his hands on her thighs. She dropped the washcloth onto the counter next to her and placed her hands flat on his chest. "So. Was that okay?"
He nodded slowly. "Almost completely."
"Want to talk about the almost part?"
He shook his head. "Not really. Not right now."
She gave him a half smile. "Okay." She leaned forward and pressed a chaste kiss to his lips. He allowed it for a long moment before wrapping an arm around her and pulling her body into his and slanting his lips over her for the kind of kiss that his arousal dictated. He knew she could feel him hard between her legs. He could feel her heat. But she didn't say or do anything other than kiss the daylights out of him. Her tongue matched his thrust for thrust, caress for caress. They dueled for dominance, neither one winning for long.
He could feel her hands against his chest, her fingertips pressing into him, before she slid them around his back to hold him more firmly to her. Still, he kissed her hungrily, like if he stopped one or both of them would suddenly realize that maybe they were taking things a bit too far or too fast, with their arousals pressing together the way they were, and their mouths doing no less than fucking. The thought made him press his hips into hers and she gasped, then mewled into his mouth. The sound was like fuel to his fire and he wanted to hear it again so repeated the action and got a hiss out of her.
She wrenched her mouth from his and pulled back looking at him with glassy, curious eyes.
"Whoa," he said, for lack of anything else to say.
"Yeah."
"I... didn't know I had that in me."
"Me either, but I'm glad to know you do," she said, then blushed.
"Me too. But... too fast."
"Yeah."
"Besides," he tossed out at her. "You haven't even thought about it," he said with a sly grin.
"I hadn't thought about it."
The grin slid off his face. "Does that mean you've thought about it now?"
"Well... yeah." She rushed forward, "But that doesn't mean I'm expecting anything." She put her hands back on his chest. "There's no rush. For anything."
"I'm just... I'm not ready."
"That's fine."
"I feel ridiculous," he said, and raked a hand through his hair. "I'm almost fifty years old. And I'm not ready to have sex?"
"Even if you hadn't just... been through what you've been through... things between us are still really new," she pointed out. "You don't have to be ready yet."
"It's not you, it's the... everything else."
"Okay."
"I just want you to know... I think I've always wanted you at least a little bit."
She ducked her head with a smile. "Well, that's flattering, I think."
"Not that I'd have ever done anything about it if-"
"I know," she said quickly, cutting him off.
"I've always found you attractive," he said, pulling his hands around to her hips.
She sunk her fingers into the hair at his temple. "I've always found you attractive, too."
He smirked at her, "Yeah?"
"From the very first day," she admitted with a shy smile.
"And still you never even once thought about..."
"I thought about kissing you. A lot. After the Broca Virus. But it was too dangerous to let myself want you that badly. So I never allowed it."
"Didn't seem to keep the feelings from developing though, did it?" he asked her gently.
"No. My plan seems to have backfired."
"Well, it's all worked out now."
"In my favor, even," she said, a cheeky smile on her face. And then, she yawned.
"Okay, that's it. It's time for bed. You were tired even before we started all of this."
"Yes, I was," she said. "But thanks for letting me do it. I'm glad it went mostly well."
He pressed a kiss to her forehead then stepped back for her to slide off the counter. He let the water out of the sink then rinsed it out. She stood there and watched as he brushed his teeth.
In the bedroom he slid between the sheets and looked over at her standing on the other side of the bed, nervously. "What's the matter?"
"How do you want to do this?"
"Oh. When I asked you to stay, I meant, stay. Not, sleep on top of the blankets to keep me company. Get in the bed, Carter," he said, a hint of amusement in his voice.
"Well," she huffed, "you don't have to laugh at me. I'm just trying to-"
"Do the right thing, I know," he said, sobering. "C'mere." He opened his arm to her and she came willingly into his side, curled up against him, her head on his shoulder, one knee curled over his thigh, her hand over his heart. He pressed a kiss against the top of her head. "Good night, Sam."
"'Night, Jack."
He lay there as she went to sleep, her breaths turning deep and even. He held her for hours before sleep finally claimed him, too.