Tarnishing the Angel
by ALC Punk!

"Walter's idea."

"Ah." She wondered if everything was Walter's idea, or if General Jack O'Neill had, at some point, actually chosen the bunting for this little celebration. "So. The president."

"Yeah."

From up here in the briefing room she could see the milling people in the gateroom. Half of them were probably already drunk, the other half being amused by it. The president had actually left half an hour before, after giving a two-minute speech that pretty much told them all he was proud of them. And he thought they were doing a damn fine job. It was nice to hear that from a politician after all of Kinsey's snide comments and dirty tactics.

There were differences, she decided as she stared down at them. Things had changed, shifted. He would have left them to die. He could still do so at any time.

More immediate, now. Maybe. And that bothered her. It bothered her a hell of a lot.

"You would have left us."

"I thought I had." He corrected her.

Colonel Samantha Carter still refused to face her commanding officer. And suddenly, she wanted this to be different. Some bitter part of her soul wanted things to have never changed like this. She wanted the old camaraderie back. Wanted to know that she was not hanging out over a precipice alone.

"I... Carter, I'm not going to lie. It wasn't the hardest decision I've ever made. But it was in the top three."

She knew, suddenly, that it wasn't because he didn't care. Far from it. He cared more for her career, more for the planet... And that made her sad. Because so did she. Her eyes closed and she fought against what might have been tears.

"Hey." The hand on her shoulder was tentative. They weren't supposed to touch. He knew it, she knew it. But now she had Pete and casual touches could be ignored because he was not the man she went home to at night.

The tears slid away, anger and bitterness filling her in a disturbing swirl. "Jack."

His name caused the hand to drop and she turned, catching him by surprise. "Carter?"

"How do you close the curtains?"

"I think it's over here." He fumbled at the side, then paused. "Why?"

"Just curious." It was a lie and they both knew it.

But he simply looked at her for a moment, then nodded and closed the curtains.

Curiously, she wondered if she would have ever had the gall to do this, or the need. Or if it was the combination of anger and pain and the fact that she was simply sick of pretending that she was over him. Or maybe this was her way of getting over him. Or destroying her career.

In that moment, she didn't care what it was. She could analyze herself later, sit down and carve out every little thought in stone.

But right now, she knew with a frightening simplicity that she wanted this man. Jack O'Neill, broken and battered and still proud. She wanted all of him. The parts that didn't quite work, the parts that did, the parts that let him order her death. Had always wanted him, and that was the bitterest irony of them all.

"Carter?"

"You know, Jack," no sir, because that would be stupid and ridiculous considering what she was planning to say, "there's something I've always wanted to do here."

He knew, she decided as his stance shifted, as he straightened and stiffened and tried to look very General-y. Which didn't work on him, because she had known him for seven years and he didn't like to be starchy and upright. She wondered if her need for this was partially his fault, then decided it wasn't.

"Carter..." His voice was careful, but he seemed to not have a clue what to say.

"I've actually had fantasies about this." There was almost a blush staining her cheeks, but she was working through anger, not embarrassment. And admitting to fantasies to this man didn't bother her. Not the way it did when Pete sometimes tried to ask her.

She pushed that thought away and began to slowly move towards him. "Generally, there wasn't a big party going on down in the gateroom."

"Carter, I think you're drunk."

The laugh that exited her mouth was full of bitterness. "I only wish I was. I'd love to be able to say that alcohol made me want you. That it was all a silly pipedream in my head brought on by hero-worship and not having had a man in too damned long." She paused, standing in front of him. "But that's not true. I stopped hero-worshiping you the moment you told me you hated scientists. And Pete's not actually that bad in bed."

"So you're not drunk."

"I want," she began unbuttoning her uniform jacket, wondering what it would be like to do the same to him. "I want a lot of things." The laugh echoed again, and she wanted it to stop because it was bitter and painful and cutting into the pieces of her soul that she had left.

"You want what, Carter?" His voice was hoarse, his eyes following the movement of her hands.

She shrugged the jacket off and tossed it onto the chair she normally sat in. "I want to fuck you on the briefing room table."

The bald words caused him to step back, his thighs hitting the edge of the table. "Uh, Carter..."

"You already said I was drunk. I'm not." She began working on the buttons on her shirt, wondering at the sudden business-like feel to her movements. She didn't want business, she didn't want calm, she wanted rage and passion and pleasure that skirted pain. Pete would never be able to understand that. Although he was good at gentle, he was good at tender, and sometimes, she thought there might be enough depth in him to do *this* to her.

"Look, Colonel--"

"Fine." She stopped. "You don't want me, you don't want this? Tell me now. Let me go, but stop pulling me to pieces every time I look at you." She snorted. "You've made fall into stupid cliches, Jack."

"Sam. Stop this."

"No." She stepped up to him, grabbed at the lapels of his jacket. "I don't want to."

There was something broken in the way he looked at her. As if he'd stepped sideways from his sanity. Or maybe she'd pushed him that last step too far. "Carter, I won't stop once this starts."

"Good." Ignoring the harshness in his voice and the way her conscience was screaming about regulations, she stretched against him, confirming that he *was* quite happy to see her. "Because you would have let me die, and I never would have gotten to do this."

The kiss wasn't gentle and soft and tender and all of those things that Pete did and she'd heard was supposed to happen. Jonas Hanson had been gentle.

Jack O'Neill was all passion and pent-up rage and anger. She understood. Because this couldn't be about love, it couldn't be about them. It had to be about anger and jealousy and pain and sadness that they lived and dealt with or shoved away every single day. For a moment, she wasn't sure either of them was aware of the other.

And then his hand slid inside her shirt, fingertips marking their way along her skin, and she groaned.

The kisses changed, lips and tongues tangling while her hands undid the buttons on his jacket. And normally she liked him in the uniform, but she wanted it off, wanted to touch and taste and feel his skin against hers. She made a growl of displeasure when he stopped her.

"Carter--"

"Now, Jack." She shoved her hand between the gap she'd created and raked her nails across the skin of his upper chest. "I want to feel you inside of me."

He turned them, picking her up and settling her on the edge of the table. Without waiting for further encouragement, she finished taking off her own shirt while he pulled his jacket over his head. It landed on the same seat hers had. So did his shirt. And then she was caught, fascinated by the muscle and skin that she never ever allowed herself to even contemplate. Reaching out a hand she skimmed it along the planes of his stomach.

The feel of skin on skin seemed to shock him as much as it had her, and he paused to reach down and slide his hands up her legs. He stopped when he reached her thighs, and the sheath there, eyebrow raising.

"Milo," she managed. He'd stopped. WHY had he stopped?

"Hrm." A smirk appeared on his lips, and his fingers toyed with the skin above and below the strap, sending shivers up and down her spine. "You wear a knife strapped to your thigh to all official functions?"

"If I can't--" she paused to gasp as the fingers slid further up, "wear my boots."

"I'll have to remember that." He bent forward and nipped at the skin of her neck, tongue sliding out to taste the hollow of her throat before he moved along.

The hands on her legs continued their flittering, stroking touch. It was almost too gentle, almost too tender. She arched her neck for him, then began running her hands along his shoulders and back and sides. Touching the skin that she'd seen a few times and always wondered how it felt. It wasn't flawless. He had wrinkles and scars and other things, but it was hers to touch right now, and so she did.

When his lips found her earlobe and suckled, she dug nails into his side.

"Ouch."

"I don't want you to be gentle."

He pulled back to stare at her, something in his gaze reminding her of their first meeting. There was challenge there, and lazy acceptance. His hand reached her panties and his fingers deftly slid beneath. She was already slightly damp from wanting him. "Like this?"

And he thrust two fingers inwards, scraping slightly and pushing at her. She moaned, grabbing onto his shoulder to stay upright as he slid them in and out. "Yes." Her voice sounded strangled and distant.

He leaned in and they kissed again, their mouths locking on each other as his fingers slid in and out.

A groan of protest escaped her when he backed up slightly and removed those fingers. Then she saw with approval that he was removing his pants, boxers and shoes. He draped them neatly over the chair. For a moment she stared at him, drank in the sight of his legs and his stomach and his thighs and his dick. He was standing there, almost self-conscious for a moment. Then he moved back between her legs and dipped his head to nip at her collarbone.

His hands skimmed up the outsides of her legs, then pushed at her skirt. "Off."

"Hrm? Oh." She shifted and ended up standing again on somewhat unsteady legs as he dealt with the zipper and pulled it down her legs along with her panties. He left the stockings and knife sheath on, fingers stroking the skin there again.

While he stooped and picked up the skirt and carefully shook it out then tossed it onto the chair they were using as a clothes-rack, she hopped back onto the table and spread her legs again.

And he stopped, and simply looked at her, eyes traveling over her from head to toe.

"Jack." She was whining, and she knew it. But she had gotten this far and she wasn't going to back down, and she really really wanted to fuck him. Now. On the briefing room table.

"Does he do this to you?" His voice was hoarse with need and anger.

"No." The honesty was compelled. Or maybe she was simply tired of living behind a mask. "Come here."

His eyes were half-lidded as he looked at her, "Demanding, aren't you."

"Damn you." She glared, "Jack O'Neill, move your ass and get over here."

He was suddenly moving, standing before her and stepping between her legs. She barely had time to register his presence before he was sliding in. A growl escaped her as his lips found her neck. And then he was moving and she was moving, and her legs were wrapping around his waist.

"Quiet." His mouth was harsh against her skin, nipping and suckling and making her whimper softly.

She didn't want to be quiet, but she understood, suddenly. She might be risking everything to fuck her commanding officer on the briefing room table. But some vestige of his humanity had remained, and he would not compromise her career. "What if I don't want to be?"

"Then we stop. Right here. Right now." And he stopped.

The cessation of movement made her want to scream in frustration. She flexed around him, smirked as he let out his own groan of pleasure. "No stopping, now, Jack."

He reached down moved back, sliding his fingers in again.

"Damn you."

"Too late for that."

She writhed under the very talented fingers sliding in and out and around. "Jack--I need you inside of me."

"Oh?"

"Yes. Now. Please." The last word slipped out unbidden, and she wanted to drag it back. She didn't want to beg him, but she needed to feel his cock inside her, sliding in and out and feeling so very different from Pete.

"Sit up." The words were an order, the tone clipped, his fingers removed.

Anger and something else made her move slowly, eyes looking into his. "Yes, Jack." No sir. She refused to call him that now.

Once she was sitting, he moved back between her legs and kissed her. With his mouth devouring the sounds of her pleasure, he thrust in again, establishing a rhythm that left her trembling and shaking, already knowing this was going to be explosive. An intoxicating combination of the taste and feel of Jack O'Neill was going to her head, and Sam was suddenly uncaring that just ten feet over and three floors down, the people who ran the base were partying.

"Look at me."

Their eyes met, his gaze searing into her as he reached down between them and ran his fingers across her. A groan escaped her.

"Is it like this -- with him?" He thrust harder, fingers slipping and sliding.

"No--" She wanted to let her head drop back, but didn't, remaining with her eyes locked, feeling the urgency in his movements. And knowing it wouldn't take her much longer. "Jack."

"What?" He stopped.

A frustrated growl escaped her. "Stop stalling."

"Can you imagine doing this with him? Fucking him in some random place?"

"No." she admitted.

"Good."

And he started again, harder and faster, the shallow strokes making her whimper. And then his fingers were there again and they pressed just right, picking up a rhythm of their own. It was all too much.

Forcing her cry to remain soft, she shattered.

Locking her legs around his hips, she leaned in and nipped at the base of his neck. "Come for me, Jack." The words sounded wrong, here and now. But she said them anyway.

"Does he do everything you want?"

Pete. It was always back to Pete, and she didn't want it to be about him, but she didn't want to stop him, if this was what it took. "Sometimes."

"Ah."

This, she realized suddenly, shouldn't be about Pete. It shouldn't be about Ba'al, or the pain that knowing he would have let them die caused. "Jack--"

"Don't."

And as he continued to thrust, his eyes holding hers, she knew that he knew. This could never be about anything but them.

Reaching up, she put her hands behind his neck and kissed him. His arms shifted, wrapping around her and dragging her that much closer. Crushing her to him, almost, and she could feel the skin and hairs of his chest on her breasts and the way his back muscles flexed as he slid in and out. And then he came, grunting softly as she tightened around him.

Subsiding backwards, she dragged him onto the table with her, wincing as the cold lacquer touched her back. "Well..."

A hand toyed with her breasts. "You've... always wanted to do this?"

"Yes."

"Ah." The hand stilled. "This..."

"I know." But for the moment, she wanted to savor the feel of Jack O'Neill half-laying on her, their legs still tangled together. It couldn't happen again.

"We should get back to the party." His voice was subdued.

"Yeah." She made no move to let him go or get up herself.

"Walter's probably lookin' for me."

"Mhmm."

"Or Davis. Did anyone tell you Major Paul Davis could be a huge pain in the ass?"

"Jack?"

They had to get up. Really.

"Yes?"

"Shut up."

Just as soon as the world ended.

-f-

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© 2005 ALC Punk!