Over a hot cup of coffee

Disclaimer - not mine, wish they were.

Rating - T

Summary - After the events of Uninvited, General Landry finds that Sam has just too little an intimate knowledge of the cabin's kitchen.

**

After a few rounds of poker, most of which had Carter losing all her chips, she gave up. Standing up from the poker table and straightening her aching back, she announced she was going to get a cup of coffee. When the others graciously ordered their own drinks, making her far too intelligent a waitress, General Landy followed her to the kitchen and offered to help.

Hank Landry had already noticed beforehand that she had a familiarity with the cabin that the others, with the exception of Teal'c, didn't have. He knew Jack O'Neill had brought them to the cabin on several occasions, most of the time right after saving the planet, so it was no wonder that she was familiar with the locations of such places as the bathroom and the shower and the guest bedrooms. But as he watched her pull out the coffee, tea, sugar and creamer from a cabinet without searching for it, then heading to the other side of the kitchen to pull a spoon from one drawer, and get the coffee pot itself from another cabinet, he realized that she was, well, acting like she was at home.

He watched her open another cabinet and pull out four mugs. Then she rummaged through for another moment and pulled a mug from way in the back. Why that one, he wondered. She stared at the mug for a moment and bit her lower lip.

"What's wrong with that one?" he asked, noting the indecision on her face.

"It's Ja- -" she caught herself in time. "-eneral O'Neill's favorite. He hates when other people drink from it."

Ahh. There it was. Landry smiled. "I'm sure he won't mind if you use it, Colonel."

She flushed for a moment. "No sir." She went on with boiling the water and preparing the teams' drinks. He stepped further into the kitchen and set himself to help her.

"So, you've been here before."

"Yes, sir. General O'Neill had the team over a couple of times."

He smiled internally. She wouldn't make the mistake of calling him Jack again. "He said there are no fish in the pond."

She chuckled. "He thinks so, but there is at least one."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, we saw it jump out once when we were fishing." She smiled wistfully. "Haven't seen it since then, though."

As far as he knew, since he'd taken command of the SGC, Jack hadn't had his old team up at the cabin. He didn't have the time for it much these days. And yet, from her words, it sounded like she was here recently. Hank wasn't a blind man, not in the least. Neither was George Hammond, whom he'd spoken to often since he'd taken command. Hammond hadn't failed to mention that there was something between O'Neill and Carter all these years. He insisted that it was never anything along the lines of fraternization, but that had they had the chance and things would have been different, it probably would have been. Since taking command of the SGC Hank tried to find any kind of clue as to what their status was now, but there was nothing evident – not even a picture of them together in her lab. There was one of the four members of SG-1 during then Colonel O'Neill's command, but not one of just O'Neill and Carter.

He had no evidence to follow up on.

Until now.

"You've been here recently," he said as he helped her place the hot cups on a tray she'd pulled out of a back cabinet a moment ago. A cabinet he didn't even know existed.

Her hands stilled. She swallowed and looked him in the eye. "Yes sir."

And realization dawned on him. "There was a folded pile of clothes, feminine clothes, on the bed in the large bedroom when I came in the other day. Looked like someone forgot to pack them when they left."

She didn't have a reply to that, but by the way her eyes closed for a second, he knew he'd caught her.

And then she surprised him. "General O'Neill must have brought a woman with him last time he was here."

"Oh Carter, come on."

She chuckled then. Realizing that there was no way out of admitting it, she relaxed. "That was really hard to say, Sir. Just imagining him with someone else – it hurts."

Hank smiled warmly at her. "So who else knows?"

She put the tray down and opened another cabinet, pulling out a bag of pretzels. "Daniel and Teal'c. And Cassie of course. No one else, except for you sir."

"I'm in good company, then."

She smiled as she poured the pretzels into a bowl she'd pulled out of one of the lower cabinets. "It's not that it's a secret, I mean, I'm not under his command anymore so there's no frat problem, but still. We don't want people wondering and talking and thinking that he's pulling strings for me. Or playing favorites."

"I can certainly understand that. The hell Carolyn's been put through since people found out she's my daughter… I can only assume what they would to you."

She smiled then. "Yes sir. Exactly." Then she looked down at the floor and took a breath. "Sir, would you mind if I picked up my clothes from the bedroom later? I've been wondering where my blue sweater went and when you just now – "

"Actually, Colonel," he cut her off. "I feel like I should be the one who sleeps in the smaller bedroom now. I feel like I'm taking up the host's room."

She grinned for a second. What was his was hers, Jack once told her. But she shook her head. "No, sir, that'd just let Colonel Mitchell and Vala in on the secret, and frankly, I really really don't want to deal with that specific headache quite yet."

Laughing at her statement, he nodded. "Alright then. Go in, pick up your clothes whenever you want, Colonel. But let me tell you one thing about hiding secrets."

"I know I should tell them, sir, it's just that – "

"Colonel, I wasn't going to tell you that everything's going to come out at one point or another. You already know that. I was going to say that if you're insisting on keeping this one secret for the length of this weekend, you should probably look like you're less at home here, or Vala's going to pick right up on it. Hell, if I managed to pick up on it, so will Mitchell."

At least she had the decency to look embarrassed. "Yes, sir. Probably a good idea."

Just then Vala bounded into the kitchen. "What's taking so long? We're drying out there!"

General Landry picked up the tray and handed it to her. "Just took us a few minutes to figure out where everything was."

He glanced over at Carter who smiled and bowed her head in thanks, and followed Vala to the main room.