A/N: Warning for mature content!

Jaime | Cripples, Bastards and Broken Things

JAIME POV

Patience had never been a strength of Jaime's.

Tyrion could wait and formulate a devious plan so he wouldn't get caught, and Cersei had always been cunning, able to bide her time and wait for the perfect opportunity to strike. Jaime though—he was a man of action, of doing; he was the one who jumped off the cliff without fear of his father's wrath or what might be at the bottom, who hated being forced to sit still. Use your head, boy! His father would yell whenever he did something rash and impulsive, and he had heard it many times as a child and young man; foolish child; wait and think; are you stupid? And then he grew up, honing his ability to act on instinct, which sometimes bordered on compulsion; and being able to do and do it well. It was what helped make him such a great swordsman.

But all day and all night he'd been thinking about it, thinking about the Stark girl's words—and perhaps the way her mouth looked when she said anything at all—and his sister's intrusive watching, fighting the urge to storm to her rooms and demand answers. Instead, he'd had to stand still, had to wait, had to be alert, had to do his duty. And Jaime wouldn't give anyone another reason to think he wouldn't do his duty.

So, he waited even though it felt like it was killing him. And when Barristan Selmy relieved him close to midnight, he took the opportunity to act, finally. It was almost a relief, if it didn't seem to fan the flames of his anger. He'd left to remove his armour, needing the weight off him after many hours, and quickly returned.

His sister was awake in her chambers and she was in a mood. It always frustrated Jaime when she was in a mood, because she wouldn't listen to a thing he said, and she'd spend the whole time drinking wine and ranting.

She sipped at her glass, eyebrow raised, haughty expression painted across the superior tilt of her beautiful face, spelling how full of shit she thought him to be right from when he'd entered the room. He probably should have thought it through before blasting into her chambers—he'd had so many hours to think it through, after-all—but he was angry; too fueled by it to stop and examine the why of it; too driven by it to do much else. It was almost like her words repeated around and around in his mind with little else, building on his drive to instinct, his fury.

He was furious to know his sister was keeping an eye on her—on him, really—and furious to know she suspected something enough to look closer. Furious at the insult of it. Furious that she would violate his privacy when he'd already shared so much of his life with her; furious she couldn't let him have this one thing without trying to ruin it for him.

He slammed the door behind him and she didn't flinch at the loud bang. She looked prepared for him, and it only made his anger surge again as he marched up to her, close enough to be able to smell the wine on her breath. She knew what she was doing, was expecting him and his anger from what he could judge of her calmness.

"You're following her?" He hissed, and if Jaime had read her cues a bit better, he would have realised he was playing his hand too heavily, too obviously. He would have realised he was basically confirming his sister's suspicions. "What the fuck, Cersei?"

"Don't be ridiculous," she snapped, not even pretending she didn't immediately know what he was talking about. She turned her back and walked a few steps away, closer to her desk and denying his rage the desire of grabbing her and squeezing. "I'm too busy to follow that stupid girl around."

"You know what I mean, Cersei," he rolled his eyes and gritted his teeth. His hands clenched and unclenched. "You're having her followed."

The strength of his fury surprised him, but he pushed away the question of why in that moment. It was hard enough to push away the round grey eyes that haunted him; he didn't want to stop and consider why they were on his mind, why they evoked too much in him, why they pushed him to provoke her and grasp at pieces of her to claim as his own. Once he started tugging on that thread, it would all come unraveled and then he wouldn't know what to do. Or more accurately, he knew he'd be stuck with the knowledge that there was nothing to be done about it; and no point in raveling it back up or trying to do something about the mess of threads he was left with.

Cersei shrugged like it meant nothing, but her cold eyes told him a different story. "I have many people followed, you've never cared about any of them before."

But none of them have been her.He tried to play it off, but he stalked closer to her desk, not quite able to pull it off. "Are you really so insecure that you'll stoop to following some northern girl around?"

She took a long draw from her cup before refilling it, knowing it would drive him mad. Her eyes—his own reflected back at him—always seemed to have more knowing to them than he liked; seeing through him, knowing his tells, sniffing out his secrets. She looked at him like she fucking knew, and that made him irrationally angry too because there was nothing to know. Sybel Stark meant nothing to him other than being a little bit of fun. "Well, why not her? Why do you take issue with me having her followed, dear brother?"

His eyes narrowed. He detested her games; detested when she pretended to be obtuse for the purposes of gaining more information; detested when she would play vulnerable to manipulate him to her will. She thought he didn't see it, but he did; he always did, he's just always thought himself in love with her enough to go along with whatever she wanted. But that was starting to wear thin now. "She's a child, not one of your scheming courtesans."

"Well, you sure do follow that child around like a little cub, brother. Everywhere she goes, there you are, begging for scraps of her attention." Her face was a mask. "A lion lusting after a wolf...pathetic. If father knew, he would be ashamed to call you son."

He had never been so angry with her. Never. He couldn't remember a time when he had the urge to grab hold of her and literally shake sense into her—not some gentle awakening shake, but her head snapping back and forth, arms trying to fight for balance. He was angry at her for implying that. But more importantly, he was angry because when he tried to play it off, tried convincing himself it was nothing, it just felt hollow. And he didn't know what to do about that.

It had started out entertaining; watching her blush, watching her surprise as he was blunt and bold in his words, watching her slip in and out of her polite manners all the while not telling anyone who could put a stop to it. And then coming back for more; more of him. It had felt like a game of how quickly he could coax out her honestly, her banter, her reaction, her flush. It was almost too-fun, when she was kind and unassuming and opposite to everything he had ever known of a woman; oblivious to the way other men watched her, hungry; oblivious to her power.

But the more he watched her, the more he realised that if she wanted, she could play the game of lords and ladies, she could learn the political steps of the game of thrones and thrive—and she tried, playing out the drilled teachings no doubt from her septa and mother; he saw it with that prancing fool Bryce Caron, he saw it in her polite but superficial interactions with everyone at court—but when she slipped back into something real and genuine, it gave him a thrill. That thrill scared him because by the time he realised there was a thrill, he realised there was a need.

It thrummed through his body like the rush of life-or-death combat; it filled his dreams with wanton whispers and pink cheeks; it drove him to seek her out like she was his fucking air. The desperation above all else terrified him because he was Jaime fucking Lannister and he would not be led around by some small, unassuming, curious girl with kind eyes and more curves than she knew what to do with.

And that same need drove him to bigger and stupider ways of provoking what he wanted out of her, of making sure she was just as preoccupied with him, and that was what had landed him in this mess.

He would deny it until his dying breath—to himself, his sister, the entire world if needed—if only for his own sake and sanity. And he knew that nothing good would come of anything else other than denial, especially when he knew—on a very conscious level that he didn't want to go to—that his anger was also largely a worry about what his sister would do to her. What her vengeance and wounded pride and jealousy would force her to do. Playing the Stark girl off as meaningless was the most important thing he could,

"This is ridiculous, Cersei," He groaned out exasperatedly, running a hand through his hair, before landing his fist on the wooden top of the desk. The glasses rattled. He tried giving her a look like this was all beneath her. "You need to stop!"

"And why should I?" She laughed without humour, an empty sound, taking a threatening step towards him, watching him pretend out loud as he ground his teeth and flexed his fingers like he wanted to hurt, as his body burned with anger and he practically waved his cards in her face. He looked like a fucking idiot.

If he had thought it through before coming in here, he would have realised sooner how it looked. Because having people followed was what she did—and she did it undiscriminatingly. If another lord had been appointed Hand of the King and brought his daughters to the Capitol, she would've had her little spies follow them too. That was how she played the game, how she kept her power, how she knew every little thing going on at the court. And him telling her to stop, showing up at her rooms in anger, was only suspicious because either he had a problem with it in this case because of her, or because of how it impacted him.

He backtracked. He searched for an alternate explanation that would be plausible, and tried the tact of concern for his sister instead. It spoke volumes that it wasn't his first line of concern.

"Because her father is the hand of the king," He reminded her, forcing out every word as though to punctuate it clearly and make an impression in her head. "What if he finds out, or she tells him, and he tells the King? You are not this foolish."

He didn't think she bought it because her eyes narrowed. Though, it could have also been the insult.

"I'm the Queen!" She yelled then, picking up a glass plate and throwing it at his feet. He was so surprised he nearly didn't move in time as it shattered against the stone floors, sending shards and splinters in every direction.

"Are you crazy?" he shouted.

"Why do you come here, brother?" She grabbed at another plate, raising her hand high and flinging it at him. She grabbed a glass. "To defend her?"

Glass was everywhere and he took large steps towards her, crunching underfoot, to grab her wrist and stop her throwing more at him. When she went to slap him with her free hand, he grabbed that too. She was breathing heavy, chest heaving partly from effort but mostly from rage. "Just admit you want to fuck her."

"You're acting like a child!" he practically yelled it at her, shaking her with some measured restraint. "Stop this madness."

Her face crumpled slightly, fight draining out of her limbs, and even though she still looked like she was rageful, the subtle change made her look vulnerable, hitting close to genuine emotion that it made him pause, loosening his grip on her. Her voice was almost a whisper. "You don't come to me anymore."

It was a statement but Jaime knew she intended it as a question but wouldn't stoop to asking it. He found her looking small and fragile, leaning in towards him. His jaw clenched and he sighed. "I've been busy, Cersei."

It was easier to claim time and duty as the culprit than his guilt. She would think he had lost his mind if he started explaining how disgust settled in his get when he thought of her and what they'd done, what he'd done. And the disgust seemed to grow every day, flourishing under unsuspecting, soft grey eyes that looked at him and saw more.

Cersei's hand brushed over the front of his breeches then, rubbing at him through the material and pushing herself up against him so he could feel the softness of her breasts, her stomach. She kissed softly at his neck until she felt the responding hardening of his length in her hand. He groaned as she whispered fervently, invitingly, "You're here now."

She knelt down in front of him and started pulling at the ties of his pants, loosening them enough to start to pull them down. Familiar desire coiled low in his gut, heavy in the rapidly-hardening weight of him, pulsing in an ache when his mind conjured images of her looking up at him from her knees, lust swirling in smokey grey, biting her full lip playfully, coyly, that made him just want to... He scrunched his face in frustration, shaking his head. "Cersei, stop."

She didn't, instead slipping her hand inside his pants to wrap around him. Her touch was like a jolt and he didn't mean to push her, knocking her off balance as he tried to move her hands away from him and shift his hips away from her. "I said stop!"

He knew he'd fucked up. He knew his rejection had hurt her deeply. There was nothing but cold malice in her eyes as her face hardened to stone, sprawled on the cold floor. "Get out! Get out!"

"Cersei—" He was tying his pants and trying to think of something—anything—to say to her but she cut him off.

She wanted to hurt him now, getting herself up off the floor and stalking towards him. He stumbled back away from her, but she kept coming. "It's that Stark whore, isn't it? It must rankle you brother, to know she will likely marry that Nightsong fool and that he will be the one to fuck her."

"Cersei—" He tried again, trying to calm himself down in the face of her best efforts to rile him. And he hated that it worked, anger spiking at the idea of that fucking idiot taking her to wife.

"It's a good thing I intervened early. Do you know how you looked, asking her favour and dancing in front of the court like some love-sick idiot?" She scrunched her face in revulsion and he realised she was herding him towards the door. Her words struck him then.

"Intervened? What do you mean intervened?" Confusion coloured his frown.

She smirked like she had formulated a grand plan and knew that its execution would hurt him as much as he'd hurt her. "You didn't really think Bryce Caron would spend so much time dallying in the gardens without a little push from me, did you?"

Silence met her words and she grinned like she'd won, her words clicking into place for him. He burned.

"What the fuck have you done, woman?" He hissed, his anger building with a vengeance.

She smirked at him, unkind. "I did promise to help her find a husband. Now get the fuck out!"

He went without any more encouragement, knowing if he stayed he would be culpable for harming the Queen. He paced a few times outside her door, fighting the urge to charge back in and scream some sense into her, but knew it wouldn't achieve anything. When his pacing didn't ease the energy burning inside him, he stalked away from her doors. He needed to hit something, hurt something, and he made his way to the training grounds. It didn't matter how late the hour was, or how exhausted he had been already because he felt none of it now.

He stomped through the castle, fingers tightening and releasing over the pommel of his sword, each step not seeming to help him calm down. He needed to spar; exert his energy until he was sore; hammer out blows; practice manouvers. He needed to just not think because his mind felt a mess, jumping between the anger of his sister, trying to figure out how to convince her there was nothing with the Stark girl while also trying not to think about her—at least not when he was still alight with energy throbbing through his body, still semi-hard in his pants.

"Fuck." His voice was hoarse.

She was nothing to him, had to be nothing to him, except maybe a little plaything for his amusement when he got bored at court—which was often. That was something Cersei could accept, surely; she loved having little playthings to control and tease; having the power. He couldn't understand what had made her so suspicious that it wasn't that simple for Jaime, in the way it was for her. Surely, that was exactly how it looked; an arrogant, bored Lannister looking for an opportunity to mock and taunt an innocent Stark girl—it was almost for Lannister House pride that he did it, right? Cersei mocked Ned Stark all the time; why did it have to be more when he mocked the daughter?

Except he knew he liked it too much. And when she bit back, when she tried to provoke him, get a rise from him, he could barely contain himself with the intensity of his response in his body. It was more than just fun, it was almost arousing, and that made him fucking furious because he didn't want it. What fucking right did she have to cause that in him? To make him feel like that; filled with an aching need and lecherous thoughts?

He shook his head. He needed to fucking stop thinking.

And then he did come to stop when he realised the corridor smelled faintly of something soft and clean and sweet and he recognised it as whatever Sybel used to wash her hair with, and before he could even have the thought to just keep going, he was already seeking it out. Like a compulsion. Like an idiot.

He found her in the library, the door open and soft candlelight able to be seen from outside as he pushed it open and walked in. She held a candle over the title of a book she held in her other hand, body leant forward to make out the words in the faint light. Jaime often saw her with a book in her hands, and he personally didn't understand it.

He looked around the room, expecting to see someone accompanying her but found it empty and silent and dark. It was stupid of her to walk around the castle by herself, even this late. She did nothing to help protect herself and that made him angry too—did she not realise the position she put herself in? Did she not realise what kind of fury his sister held for her, and how easy she made it for herself to be vulnerable to it? He snapped at her before he could get a handle on himself. "What are you doing here so late at night?"

She jumped, startled and turned to look at him, her eyes wide, cheeks spreading with that colour he couldn't not track. She looked surprised to see him, probably not expecting to see anyone given the hour. "I couldn't sleep, ser Jaime."

"And where is your sworn protector?" He all but sneered and he saw the responding confusion at his aggression, seemingly out of the blue. "He must be here somewhere given that he rarely leaves your side?"

He knew the Capitan of their household guard wasn't there, but he also knew the kind of reaction his implication earned him—she would drop the niceties and he would watch her irritation build and it would stoke that perverse thrill inside him, systematically replacing the burn of anger with the burn of want.

Her confusion melted and was replaced with ire, and his eyes lapped it up. She raised a challenging eyebrow like she would at her younger siblings, daring them to try her tolerance. All it looked to Jaime was an invitation. "Surely it's too late for us to be repeating this conversation?"

"I don't know if it counts as a conversation if one party isn't listening." He folded his arms in response, the petulant child willing to push it. The topic of Jory Cassel was not one he could easily let drop though, because it did bug him how she didn't see it. How she just assumed he was riling her up, as though there was no way the honourable Jory Cassel could in any way be lowered to debaucherous thoughts, let alone ones of her.

It seemed to almost reinforce how little she did to protect herself in a world she definitely needed protecting in, because how could she not see the way the guardsman watched her with wanting, the way his gaze dropped to trace over her curves when he could. And how had it fallen to him, Jaime Lannister, to be the one to protect this oblivious, trusting girl?

She eyed him like she was trying to understand why he was on the attack tonight, why he continually pushed the topic, before rolling her eyes with force, incredulous. "Did you seek me out to pick a fight, ser? Because if so, I think I'll excuse myself now."

He wasn't prepared to let her go and he racked his mind for something to say as she returned her chosen book back to the shelf.

"Are you going to marry him?" He just blurted it out. It had to still be on his mind from his fight with his sister for him to ask that. She frowned and gave him a look like she questioned his sanity. At this point, he was questioning his sanity too. What the fuck did he care who she married? His question sounded far more genuine than he was comfortable sounding and all he succeeded in doing was pissing himself off. He didn't give any fucks about her. "You know, I've always been taught that a proper noblewoman wouldn't have her head turned by just anyone. But one look from Caron and you're practically in his bed begging for him."

She blushed deep red in indignation, her voice a controlled whisper. "Why are you saying these things to me?"

She was just the unlucky target that he was working out all his anger and frustration on; as effectively as swinging his sword it would seem. "I'm just playing my part—the honour-less Kingslayer. And look, you're playing your part too—the pretty Stark virgin waiting to be fucked by her husband."

She sucked in her cheeks and looked him dead-on, taking him aback with the intensity of her leveled stare. That stare all but put him in his place, and she looked like she knew what he was doing and wasn't going to play today. "Of the two of us here, I'm not the one who thinks you're without honour."

She looked like she meant it too. Stupid, oblivious girl. He could not understand why; after everything he did and said to her, after he riled and provoked; after he said things no good knight should say to a lady; how could she think that? It grated on him. She thought she knew him.

Who was she to think he had honour?

He somehow managed to get the words out from between clenched teeth. "That's a mistake. Haven't you been listening to anything I've said? Haven't you been listening to your father—surely the righteous Ned Stark has warned you clear enough away from me by now?"

"Do you know what I think?" She ignored his question and mused out loud, keeping her stare right on him, catching every slight movement, every twitch of muscle, every breath he took. She kept him there, immobilised, as she watched him like she saw him and saw through him. She watched closer than she should; closer than anyone had bothered to look. "I think you're all talk, Jaime. I think you pretend that you don't care about anything, or that you don't care what people think of you, because if you don't care then that way at least it's easier."

The muscles of his lower abdomen clenched when she said his name, when his eyes stuck to the way her lips moved when she said it. His jaw clenched in anger. He didn't know when he started breathing heavy through his nose. "Easier than what, my lady? Enlighten me."

He didn't know why he felt so threatened at the idea of her knowing more of him than she should. Maybe because he'd worked so fucking hard to push away all those little bits of him that could be twisted and used and manipulated to other's gain. Maybe because if she saw them then maybe he wasn't doing as good a job as he thought. And maybe because she should be the last person in the world who he should want to know him, who had the right to know him.

She pursed her lips in thought. "Easier to stand by and not bother doing the right thing, the noble thing."

His words were a hiss. "What the fuck would you know about being noble?"

She wasn't expecting him to lash out in wrath, but he was wrathful in that moment. He stepped in close towards her and her mouth dropped in surprise, taking a step back. She was just a little girl, out of her depth and playing games with people who had more power than her. She had no idea what he could do, what he had done, and she presumed to know him. She knew nothing; nothing of the world or his experiences; nothing of what people were really like; nothing of what they would do given half the chance. She lived in a fantasy world where noble always equaled right. "Being noble, following honour, meant standing outside the door every night while the mad king raped the queen."

She flinched and he thought maybe he frightened her, but she didn't look scared and it wasn't enough to stop him now, the words pouring forth to meet her innocent wide eyes and make her understand. "While she screamed and begged for him to stop and he just laughed. Doing my duty meant watching while your grandfather burned, meant protecting the King while he threatened to burn the whole of Kingslanding and ordered me to kill my own father. And when I stopped doing my duty, when I did the right thing and killed him, look at what that got me. A title of Kingslayer and a disdain from houses like yours."

He'd never told anyone what had happened that day, not fully. Cersei hadn't even asked, only smiled to know he'd killed the King and she was going to marry the new one. Ned Stark had deemed him guilty the moment he saw Aerys' blood on his sword, and had held it against him ever since. His own father hadn't cared to know the details, right onto arranging his pardon without ever stopping to think that he might have saved everyone that day.

Sybel's eyebrows were drawn together as she regarded him, like she was watching puzzle pieces try to come together, like she felt all the sadness his tale could conjure. "I..."

He didn't want her sadness. He wanted her anger.

He rounded on her, both with his words and with his body, so that they were less than a step away from each other. Her back pressed into the wooden shelves and she had to tilt her head up to look at him. She kept looking at him though, never looking away despite how graphic his words were. He locked his gaze on her. "Who are you to talk to me about duty? Isn't the dutiful thing listening to your father and staying far away from me? Or can Stark's just do whatever they please, without recompense, because they're Stark's?"

Her eyes widened. She didn't know what to say and he felt like he'd won, until she just kept looking at him with that understanding expression.

She didn't have the judging eyes her father had, the kind that stripped the skin completely off his bones so that he felt like he was nothing—hers made him want to strip the skin right off himself. Even though they were the same glinting steel grey, they didn't leave him feeling like he was less, like he was on trial and judged guilty and found wanting and not even worth spit. Hers were filled with warmth and sincerity as though they expected him to bare himself to her; to leave himself before her, exposed and vulnerable, helpless and pathetic; to show her into his mind and his heart and his very being—right down to his soul. That was, if he had one.

Her eyes reached right inside him and pulled those pieces of him out; pieces he didn't know he had; pieces he'd buried and pushed down, down, down, deep and hidden; pieces he'd forgotten about since the day Kingslanding had fallen and he'd killed the mad king. Pieces he didn't want her to see, but that she took anyway, digesting and withstanding, before coming back for more. And he disgusted himself because he let her.

He hid behind smirks and taunts and violence, and he was good at it; he carried it around like he did his sword—a reassuring presence that he never went anywhere without until it was second nature—he wore it like armour, for years and years and years. And then some wide-eyed, soft-spoken, empathetic little girl peeled it off like it was nothing, and he felt like a fucking pervert with what else he was thinking about peeling off.

And she looked at him, like that. Like he was something. Like he was something more. And fuck, he was pretty much screwed because there was a tentative part of him that wanted to be something more when she looked at him like that. And what a ludicrous idea that was. Jaime was under no disillusion about exactly who and what he was, but sometimes when he got caught up in those grey eyes, he would let himself forget—just for a moment.

"Stop it." He demanded, breathing heavy. He didn't realise how close she was to him, how close he'd put her as he'd tried to make his point—only noticeable now that he'd finished his story and was left with her looking at him.

"Stop what?" She asked, confused. She was close enough to nearly taste on the air—that sweet, inviting smell that he knew too well and made him feel tight in his body.

He felt breathless, trying not to breathe when every breath in was her; when it worked its way into his brain and made it hard to think of anything else. He swallowed hard, trying to hold onto the frustration he felt with her. "Stop looking at me like that."

Her eyes were still wide, unblinking; a tight hold that he suddenly felt he had no strength to fight, so he just kept looking too. "I'm not looking at you like anything, Jaime!"

"You're looking at me like I'm the good knight—like I'm the chivalrous, noble, protect your honour knight," he gritted out over a rapidly beating heart. Didn't she realise how ridiculous that was? How foolish it was to think that of him? She had no idea how many times he'd thought about taking her honour—over and over. "I'm not that knight."

She managed to raise a challenging eyebrow at him despite his body all but overpowering her, despite all the control he held in that moment, and despite his hard eyes screaming at her to back down. It made him hot. "I don't believe you."

She frustrated him beyond belief—he couldn't be clearer than he was being, when he told her point blank like that. He groaned with exasperation, looking around the room in irritation like he was searching for something to talk sense to her, but he knew there wasn't anyone there but old books. She bit her lip and his eyes immediately dropped to the movement, watching closely and seeming to trace the curve and commit it to memory—as if he hadn't done that already. He ran a hand through his gold hair, holding on like he was going to yank it out.

She blushed; cheeks filling with colour under his locked, scrutinizing gaze. And then he was just acting on instinct—there was no thinking involved; there wasn't even time for the thinking to catch up, because he took that last step into her, closing the gap between them easily and pushing her hard into the shelves and books behind her with his body. One hand locked around her wrist, pinning it above her head against the shelf, the other gripped her delicate neck, too rough, and then his mouth landed on hers, hot and forceful.

Her candle clattered to the floor in surprise, the small flame blowing out.

He expected her to push him away, to hit him or slap him or even bite him; he had no right to touch her like this, to invade her space and force himself on her. Her fingers scrabbled against the material of his shirt and then she was pulling him in closer instead of away. It was like a sweet, saving relief to have her body pressed to his but it was quickly replaced with a burning, damning ache for more when she didn't shove him away.

She was so soft against his unmoving body, he could feel all the curves of her press into him, only the thin material of her nightdress and gown covering her and doing nothing to disguise the shape of her. He felt a responding tightening low in his abdomen and wanted to rip those layers away until there was nothing.

She whimpered softly into his mouth, like she felt that wildfire in her body too, and it was only an encouragement. He kissed her with desperation, her mouth opening and inviting, and his tongue brushed over hers to taste her. It was overwhelming, intoxicating, and he forgot to breathe until his lungs burned. He pushed his want into that kiss until she was burning with it, and his right hand shifted from her neck, down her body, sliding and grabbing, and gliding over her waist to pull her into him because she still wasn't close enough. Her fingers threaded through his soft, golden hair and pulled his mouth closer too, like she thought the same.

He couldn't get enough. He wanted more. His hand continued down, grabbing at her ass with a tight grip before letting go to hitch her leg up around his waist, the skirts of her nightdress ripping slightly with the force of the movement. It gave him space to press his lower body into her, his hard length grinding—

She pulled back from his lips to suck in air in a short gasp that became a loud moan, making desire shoot through him. He wanted to hear that sound again. "Oh gods."

His lips descended to her neck, biting and sucking until he found a spot that had her breathing heavy and her hips bucking forward into his, seeking out pressure and friction and more. He moaned low and hoarse in her ear, setting goosebumps over her skin. He wanted to hear the hitch in her moan, wanted to hear the desperation on her breath, "Say my name."

He was rocking his hard cock into the warm space between her legs and needed more, needed to feel more of her. His free hand pawed at her chest, brushing over her tightened nipples as he tried to push the material out of the way. It intensified the throbbing of his cock, and she threw her head back, body arching into his, begging for more. Her voice was gasping, "Jaime—"

He wanted to explode.

He heard loud, clanging footsteps as a couple guards patrolled down the corridor, heading towards their post for the remainder of the night, and the sound made his stomach drop to the ground, a harsh enough jolt of reality into the heady sensations of the moment to realise what the fuck he was doing. Was he deranged?

He let her go like she'd burned him, pulling back and watching the confusion on her face, like someone being woken from a deep sleep and struggling to adjust to being awake, sluggish and slow. They both panted in the space between them and Jaime felt like he'd run a mile. She opened her mouth as if to question how they had gone from that to this, but he put his hand over her so she couldn't make a sound. The last thing he needed was to be caught—by the gods, the last thing she needed was to be caught. He turned his head to listen to the guards passing by, chattering about their training and complaining about the heat that night.

When they were gone and it was quiet, he let go of her mouth and turned back to look at her to find the temper in her eyes that didn't at all seem to help lessen the bulge in his pants. He watched her regain her senses, watched it play out over her face as she took in what they had done, eyes darting between the shelves where they'd been rubbing against each other, to the state of her robe and nightgown. Her fingers touched her kiss-swollen lips and pieced it all together, and he felt simultaneously pleased with himself and ashamed.

He surely must have lost his mind; what had possessed him to think that was a good idea? That kissing her and touching her and being indecent with her was the thing to do? That that would surely make his point that he wasn't honourable? That he needed to make his point to that degree? How selfish it was to think only of what he wanted and nothing at all to the consequences for her—wasn't that what she'd been saying all along? Wasn't that her frustration from the beginning, what it could look like for her? What if they'd been seen or heard? Because he'd wanted to make a point.

Or was he just so desperate to kiss her, touch her, be indecent with her that he was willing to let that be his excuse? I was just making a point when I started fornicating with you, I didn't mean anything by it.

If that were true, he wouldn't be so fucking hard right then.

He needed to leave because he felt so out of control that he didn't trust himself—couldn't trust himself after that. He acted like he'd never been touched in his life, like some touch-starved, easily excitable teenage boy. All he could do was utter a, "Fuck."

And then he left her there and didn't look back.

A/N: Oh boy once I got started, I couldn't stop so ended up with a whole chappie of Jaime POV that I definitely haven't edited as much as I should! I hope you enjoyed it anyway because it was fun to write haha poor conflicted Jaime XD