Sansa dreamt of Jaime Lannister's gorgeous face and broad chest. And his muscular arms. And his chiseled abs. She startled herself awake just as dream-Jaime was removing his boxers to show her the rest. She spent a few more minutes in bed, shivering despite the warm room and panting for air as if she'd taken the stairs all the way from the Lion's Mouth to the Lannister's living quarters, trying to process what had happened before she was finally able to muster the will to roll out of bed.

It was mortifying—Sansa did not have sex dreams. Ever. She didn't know what to do with herself now that she had. She had never really gotten anything out of touching herself, except more frustration and an even greater desire to orgasm without being able to actually get herself there.

Fortunately, by the time she had used the bathroom, washed her face and brushed her teeth, and pulled on a pair of cotton shorts and a t-shirt, the throbbing between her legs had subsided into almost nothing. Unfortunately, there was no way she could get back to sleep. She padded down to the kitchen to find herself some caffeine instead. And maybe some food besides the gummy bears and Funyuns she had been consuming the past two days.

She found Jaime Lannister in the kitchen.

Again.

She was not prepared to say whether this was a good thing or a bad thing.

At least he was alone this time. Praise the Seven.

His green eyes met her blue over the top of the orange juice carton, which he was, of course, drinking out of directly.

"Good morning, captain," Sansa greeted him softly, trying her absolute hardest not to let her gaze fall to his bare chest and abdomen.

He choked, as if he had sucked his drink down his windpipe, and pulled the carton away from his mouth. A few drops of juice escaped his lips and dripped onto his chest, and Sansa couldn't help but follow its progress with her eyes. Does he ever wear a shirt? she wondered, half in appreciation and half in exasperation. When she dragged her gaze back up to his face, he was grinning. He had apparently not shaved since the last time she had been so near him, and his stubble and the cocky look on his face somehow made him even more attractive.

"It's just Jaime," he reminded her, and she realized that he thought she had been making some sort of joke when she had referred to him by his rank.

Sansa considered correcting him, but that would mean bringing up her humiliation at the airpot yet again….

"What are you doing up?" he interrupted her internal debate before she could decide.

"I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep," she explained truthfully. I was dreaming of you, she thought, also truthfully, but did not tell him that. "I thought I would try to find some real food for a change."

Jaime scrutinized her for long, silent seconds, his head tilted to one side and his green eyes flashing with curiosity. Sansa thought he resembled a golden lion at the zoo, watching from the other side of the bars for any opening to get his claws into someone. It made her so uncomfortable that she considered simply turning around and walking out of the kitchen and back to her room and pulling the covers over her head and refusing to come out for the rest of the week.

"You haven't had a chance to go to the beach yet, have you?"

Sansa blinked; that was not at all what she had expected.

"No…" she acknowledged, drawing the word out just a bit to indicate her confusion. "Margaery hasn't felt up to going out."

He made a noise somewhere between a snort and a laugh. "Personally, I prefer Joffrey's absence to his presence, but there's no accounting for taste."

Sansa secretly agreed. She may have had a silly, short-lived crush on Joffrey, who shared the same impossible beauty of his family—well, of his mother's family anyway, not the Baratheons. However, his arrogance, meanness, and generally disgusting attitude had cured her of that almost immediately. Margaery may have a sharp tongue and an ambitious streak ten miles wide, but Sansa thought she was essentially a kind person. She had no idea what her friend saw in Joffrey Baratheon. She could only assume that Margaery saw the wealth and influence of his family (that is, of his mother's family) and that it had blinded her to the reality of Joffrey himself.

But Sansa had never spoken her concerns out loud, and she wasn't going to start now. Certainly not to Joffrey's uncle.

"Will he definitely be here tonight, then?" she prodded, rather than address what Jaime had said.

He shrugged his (broad, muscular, perfect) shoulders. "Too soon to say. I expect we'll have news this afternoon."

"Oh," was all Sansa could think of to say.

"But fuck Joffrey," he declared matter-of-factly, as if he were announcing that he didn't like mushrooms or that Lannisters shat gold. "You shouldn't let him ruin your vacation. I'm heading down to the beach now, if you want to come."

Sansa's eyes went wide, both at his language and at his suggestion.

"I haven't let him ruin my vacation," she informed him primly, for lack of any other response coming to mind. "I've been supporting my friend."

"… Who has let Joffrey ruin her vacation," he completed her sentence for her, rolling his eyes as he turned to fill his water bottle up in the refrigerator door. "In my experience, Margaery and Cella won't be up for a couple of hours at least. You can go find a window and stare at the ocean until then, or you can come with me and put your toes in the sand while I surf. I'll even take you out for breakfast afterwards, if you can wait that long."

Sansa registered, for the first time, that he was wearing a wetsuit and the top half of it was hanging down around his legs.

"I, I haven't got on my swimsuit or, or sunscreen," Sansa nearly stuttered.

"Sansa, go get your shit," he ordered with a smile, "and be back here in ten minutes."

Between her pleasure at being the object of his attention and her nervous anticipation at being the object of his attention, she couldn't have said which emotion made her blush the most. Either way, she all but fled the room to make her way upstairs.

Oh, by the Seven, she was going to spend the morning alone with him. She was going to go swimming with him. Alone.

Sansa was not shy about her body, exactly. She knew that she had a good figure. Not a particularly voluptuous one like Margaery's, as Sansa was far too thin for that, but she was womanly enough and had near-perfect proportions. She had just never had much opportunity to wear a swimsuit in public. She had availed herself of the hot springs at Winterfell often, but that was private, unless she counted her brothers' close friends. Theon Greyjoy had been known to leer at her when Robb and Jon weren't looking, but Sansa hardly counted him. And the swimsuits she wore at Winterfell had been practical one pieces her mother or her septa had bought for her.

She had certainly never been near a man like Jaime Lannister while wearing little more than a few scraps of fabric to preserve her modesty.

Sansa spent so long comparing the swimsuits in her suitcase that she left herself only a few minutes to change and run back downstairs before Jaime went without her. She ended up with a solid blue bikini that offered fuller coverage than her others. (She felt far too self-conscious to wear one of the string contraptions her friends had picked out.) She threw a long, flowy sun dress over it and secured the top half of her hair out of her face with a claw clip so that the long, red waves flowed freely down her back.

Jaime met her in the corridor outside the kitchen with a thermos in one hand and a pre-packaged protein bar in the other.

"To tide you over until breakfast," he announced as he thrust them both into her hands.

Sansa managed to smile and nod her thanks, but she couldn't seem to speak around the lump that had suddenly developed in her throat.

The journey to the beach involved Sansa's first ride in one of the golf carts she had heard so much about. They sped along at a good clip, certainly at least fifteen miles per hour. Sansa was sure that if they'd had a faster vehicle, he would have had that pedal pressed to the floor, too.

"We only keep electric carts inside the castle," he explained somewhat mournfully as they bounced over a bump that sent Sansa careening sideways into his hard, unyielding form. "There isn't enough ventilation for gas-powered ones."

There followed an elevator ride, which took even longer than the one they'd taken from the Lion's Mouth up to the residences. And then a trek down a dark spiral staircase that wound into the depths of Casterly Rock, illuminated only by a few sconces carved into the walls at far enough intervals that they seemed to cast more shadow than light, until Jaime shouldered open a heavy wood door that appeared to be a solid four inches thick and part of the original castle. They emerged into a cavern lit by natural sunlight.

When Sansa's eyes adjusted to the brightness, she could see that they were in a medium-sized cavern of perhaps fifty feet wide and twenty-five feet deep, which was used as a garage.

There was an older model truck, one Sansa never would have imagined the Lannisters would own, which was jacked up on tires much larger than the ones she knew had come with it from the factory. There was also another classic Bronco; this one was orange and had places where the paint had visibly worn thin, not utterly pristine like the white one Jaime had been driving when he picked them up from the airport, and had a surfboard strapped to a rack on the roof. It was lifted almost as high as the pickup truck. There were also two boats (a sporty looking one that seemed built for speed and one that appeared to be a fishing boat) and two sleek waverunners.

Jaime headed toward the Bronco, glancing back at her over his shoulder.

"Most people use the beach directly below the family apartments," he informed her. "The water is calmer there, because it's protected by the rocks, and it's just an elevator ride away. But the surf is better where we're going."

Sansa spent a few seconds studying the distance between the ground and the floorboard of the Bronco. Ultimately, she grasped for a handhold and, after bouncing a few times for momentum, heaved herself up and inside. When she had finally settled in her seat and adjusted her skirt around her legs, she looked over to find Jaime watching her from the driver's seat with laughter dancing in his cat-like green eyes.

She huffed and shot him a glare. "I guess I won't be swimming, then."

Jaime grinned again, clearly amused by her annoyance, and shook his head as he cranked the truck.

"It's safe enough to go in if you like, as long as you don't get too far out."

The cave entrance had been paved over to form a ramp that sloped gently down to the beach. Jaime drove directly onto the sand, which Sansa found disconcerting yet exciting. The ride was smoother than she would have expected. She put that down to the vehicle's suspension, which she had thought was ridiculous until she knew that this was what he planned to do. They didn't go far, maybe only a couple of miles, before they rolled slowly to a stop on a random spot on the beach that, as far as Sansa could tell, wasn't any different from any of the ones they'd driven past on their way to this one.

Jaime hopped out without any issues, but Sansa stared at the distance between her feet and the ground in trepidation, wondering how she should get down. Jumping forward out of the truck would surely sting her feet and ankles, but it seemed too high to go out sideways like one normally would. She was just contemplating how best to turn around in her seat and lower herself out backwards when Jaime appeared in front of her open door.

"Need a hand, princess?"

He didn't wait for her to answer before grasping her around the waist and effortlessly lifting her out of her seat. Sansa barely had time to register what was happening and scramble to grab at his shoulders before her feet touched the sand. Maybe that was a good thing, else she would have been the color of a tomato. This way, she did not have time to fully comprehend the feeling of his warm skin underneath her hands before he took a step away from her and reached back inside the vehicle, emerging with the thermos and protein bar she had stashed in the cupholders.

By the time Sansa had arranged herself in the sand on a blanket that Jaime kept in the back of his truck, he had covered his arms and torso with his wetsuit and retrieved his surfboard from the roof rack. She half-hoped he would come over to talk before he headed out, but he only gave her a wave and a grin as he made his way past her and into the water at a jog.

She sipped on her coffee (prepared exactly how she liked it, which was a welcome surprise) and watched curiously as Jaime paddled through the surf, somehow diving through the waves, until he was at least seventy yards from shore. Sansa held her breath when he leaned down across his surfboard and began paddling hard back towards the beach as a wave rose up behind him, then released it with a sigh when he hopped up and stood on top of his board. When he finally reached the beach, he offered Sansa another wave before immediately turning and running back into the surf.

Sansa lost count of the number of times he paddled into the ocean, and she hadn't brought her phone with her to keep track of the time. Long after she had emptied her thermos and inhaled the protein bar, she finally worked up the courage to remove her dress and make her way down to the water.

She had never experienced anything like it. Certainly not at the hot springs of Winterfell or on the shores of Long Lake, which was as close to the beach as her father had ever been willing to go. She gave into her impulse to jump into the next oncoming wave, laughing delightedly when she seemed to float for a few seconds before her feet touched the sand again. The water splashed around her body and misted across her face, but the bitter taste of salt on her lips was hardly a deterrent.

It had been a good idea to come with Jaime. Even if Myrcella and Margaery had agreed to visit the beach, Sansa doubted that they would have wanted to play like this, or that she would have been brave enough to do it anyway, by herself, as they watched and judged.

Some unknown amount of time later, her splashing was interrupted by a familiar, deep voice.

"Having fun?"

Sansa whirled around, nearly tripping and dunking her own head beneath the surface. Jaime was standing behind her, thigh-deep in water with the upper part of his wetsuit already peeled off his body. He seemed completely oblivious to the way water dripped out of his hair to run down the valleys created by the defined muscles of his shoulders and chest, which made his skin glisten in the early morning sun. Or maybe he was just unaware of the effect such a sight had on Sansa. Or maybe he knew but was being a gentleman about it.

Sansa swallowed and then gave him a smile. "Oh, yes! Very much! Thank you for bringing me, Jaime."

She realized, just after she said it, that this was the first time she had ever said his name out loud. He seemed to realize it too, if the satisfied smirk on his face was any indication.

"You can tag along every morning if you want," he told her. Before Sansa had time to process his invitation and express her pleasure at it, he added, "I was looking forward to seeing you in whatever scrap of fabric and dental floss Margaery calls a bikini, though. Promise you'll wear one of those tomorrow?"

Sansa spluttered and felt her cheeks burn as she stared into his glittering green eyes. No doubt she looked exactly like the inexperienced, embarrassed little girl that she actually was. So much for playing it cool around him.

He grinned so widely that the skin around his eyes crinkled. "Come on, Stark. I promised you breakfast."

"Sansa," she managed to say, her voice higher than usual. At his raised eyebrow, she clarified, "Call me Sansa. When you call me 'Stark' it makes me think that my father or brother are standing behind me."

"Ah. We wouldn't want that, Sansa."

He caressed the syllables of her name with his mouth in a way she had never contemplated was possible. Sansa may have had zero experience, but she had a very, very active imagination. However, it had simply never occurred to her that someone saying her name could be so sensual. She could well imagine it now. The nearly-naked form of dream-Jaime came to the forefront of her mind, only now, instead of being silent, he whispered her name against her skin. In the real world, she shivered as she trailed behind the man as they made their way back to his Bronco, stopping along the way to collect the blanket and his surfboard, happy that he couldn't see her and guess what she was thinking about.

They rode across the beach in silence for several minutes. Sansa had expected Jaime to pull onto the highway, but he drove past the first two access roads they came to. As she watched the second one pass by, her curiosity must have shown on her face, because Jaime took it upon himself to explain.

"The air pressure in the tires is really low, strictly for driving on sand. To take her out on pavement I'd have to get out and air them up, then get out and deflate them back down to drive on the beach back home."

"Oh," said Sansa, who hadn't been at all aware of the intricacies of driving on sand and had never aired up or deflated a tire in her whole life.

Eventually, they bounced up a small embankment and came to a stop on a small patch of flat sand behind a row of buildings. Sansa waited impatiently as Jaime rounded the front of the Bronco to help her down, anxious to have his hands around her waist again. Since she expected it this time, she was able to use the few seconds she spent in his arms to appreciate the feeling of warm, soft skin over the hard muscles of his shoulders.

If he noticed that her hands lingered a moment too long after her feet touched the ground, he didn't call her out on it.

They had driven all the way into Lannisport, apparently into the oldest part of the city judging by the architecture. Sansa had somehow expected a Lannister to dine at a more upscale establishment, even if he was wearing board shorts with Yoda printed on them and a wrinkled t-shirt he had pulled out of the depths of his back seat. She was pleasantly surprised when he led her into a little café that looked like it hadn't been renovated or printed new menus in decades. It reminded her a little bit of Winter Town. Of home.

It seemed like every pair of eyes in the entire room turned to look at them as they walked in, and everyone stopped talking.

"Don't worry about them," Jaime instructed as he helped her into a booth in the back corner of the café—a totally unnecessary but chivalrous gesture that made Sansa's knees go weak. "They're just not used to seeing two such gorgeous people at the same time."

That bit of ridiculousness earned a giggle from Sansa. Of course, she was sure people often stopped whatever they were doing to look at him; that was, essentially, exactly what she had done when he had strolled into the airport. But his words were a complete exaggeration with respect to herself, especially when compared side-by-side with him.

Jaime slid into the bench opposite her and stretched out his legs. One of his knees bumped against hers, and his other foot brushed by Sansa's and finally came to rest with their calves pressing together. Sansa bit her lip in an attempt to hold back another blush. (Was there even any blood left for the rest of her body at this point?) She was determined not to pull back or say anything to him about it. It was completely innocent—it had to be—and she would not give him the satisfaction of acting like a tittering schoolgirl.

He completely ruined her plans when he asked, "So, Sansa, how do you feel about older men?"

She knew that she must look like a deer in the headlights, her determination not to look like a fool in front of him thrown completely out the window. But she'd be damned if she could do anything about it.

"Older men?" she squeaked.

"Yes. For example, hypothetically, how open would you be to sleeping with one of your friend's uncles, if he were incredibly attractive?"

A pretty, plump waitress appeared next to their table then. Well, to speak plainly, she appeared at Jaime's side and utterly ignored Sansa. Despite the rude disregard for her and Jaime's obvious annoyance at the girl's behavior, Sansa had never been so happy to see anyone in her life. It gave her a chance to compose herself. If only barely.

Jaime turned his frigid glare away from the waitress and looked back at Sansa, his gaze softening. "What do you want, Sansa?"

You, her mind supplied immediately. Gods, yes, I want you.

"I'll have the pancakes," she managed to order with a straight face as she stared into his eyes. "With extra butter and syrup."

Sansa felt completely at sea. She had never planned a sexual assignation with anyone before. She had never agreed to sleep with her best friend's uncle and then had to spend the entire day with said friend, pretending like she cared whatsoever about whatever Cella and Margaery were moping about while she daydreamed (and panicked, then daydreamed some more, then panicked some more) about what would happen that night. And she had certainly never had to sit through the most painfully awkward dinner she had ever endured, watching her would-be lover ignore her almost entirely.

Lord Lannister and Joffrey had returned home earlier that afternoon, much to Margaery's delight, for all that she hadn't been permitted to see her boyfriend. He had spent the entire afternoon in Tywin's office, along with his mother and his uncle and a bevy of people in expensive-looking suits who Sansa thought could only be lawyers.

Sansa still had no idea what on earth Joffrey had done. Maybe she could ask Jaime about it. Not before they had sex, of course; she had no desire to talk about Joffrey Baratheon just before she lost her virginity, and she seriously doubted Jaime would find the topic a turn on either. And not directly after either, while Sansa expected they'd be basking in the afterglow. But maybe tomorrow, if he kept his word to take her to the beach again.

What if he doesn't? her treacherous mind demanded. What if all he wants is sex, and once you give it to him it's like you never existed?

He wouldn't do that, she told herself stubbornly, though she had absolutely no reason to think she knew anything about him other than that he was breathtakingly handsome and funny and very forward and liked to surf.

Jaime had caught her elbow just before she entered the formal dining room and whispered, "This is going to be an absolute shit show. Just try to ignore them, and don't engage unless you have to."

Surely a man would need to care for her at least a little bit to warn her against his own family like that?

He was right, too: It was an absolute shit show.

Sansa had no idea what Cersei had been thinking to plan a formal dinner mere hours after Joffrey returned (from wherever he'd been). Her son was so dramatically sullen that he seemed determined to make everyone else just as miserable as he was, most particularly Margaery, who bore his cruel remarks and snide comments in near total silence. Sansa wanted to jump in, but she thought her intervention would only make things worse, so she gritted her teeth and stayed quiet. Tywin and Jaime were both so obviously furious with Joffrey that they couldn't look at him without glowering. Myrcella hadn't made a peep all evening. And Cersei was apparently content to ignore all of that and pretend like things were perfectly normal.

When the dinner plates were cleared away and immaculate slices of chocolate cake were placed in front of them, Sansa prayed that they could make it through dessert without further incident. It was not to be.

"Should you be eating that?" Joffrey's snotty voice carried loudly down the entire table, though his question was clearly directed at his girlfriend.

Margaery froze with a small forkful of cake halfway between the plate and her mouth.

From the expression of wide-eyed dread on her pretty face, Sansa doubted she would be capable of responding. They never had to find out, because Jaime's voice, even colder and harsher than it had been when Sansa had overheard him fighting with Cersei, broke the silence that had fallen over the room.

"Apologize to Lady Margaery."

"What?" asked Joffrey, looking somewhere between flabbergasted and furious.

"Jaime—" began Cersei in the same cloying, saccharine voice she had used on him before.

"Shut up, Cersei," barked Jaime without bothering to look at her. From her position almost directly across the table from him, Sansa could see the hard glint of his eyes as they bore into his nephew's. "You heard me: Apologize. To. Margaery."

Joffrey's pointy faced flushed nearly purple with anger and, if he was capable of feeling it, probably embarrassment. "I won't!" he screeched. "She deserves it!"

"Ser Jaime, it's fine. It really is," Margaery finally found her voice, though it trembled audibly.

Sansa thought it was clear that it was not fine.

"It is not fine," Jaime voiced Sansa's unvoiced thoughts, his eyes never leaving Joffrey's. "I have no idea why the fuck Margaery wants anything to do with a vile, useless shit like you, but until she comes to her senses, you will treat her with respect."

"You have made your point, Jaime," stated Lord Lannister himself, his voice deep and somewhat raspy and fully commanding.

Jaime's lips drew back into a near-snarl as he rose from his seat and tossed his wadded up napkin onto his plate.

"No, I haven't," he insisted, his own voice equally as deep and commanding as his father's, "and we both know this won't be the end of it."

If Sansa hadn't known better, she would have thought that the corner of Lord Lannister's mouth twitched in an aborted smile. But no one had seen Tywin Lannister smile since before she'd been born.

"Oh, and what 'point' would that be?" Cersei broke in snidely, rolling her beautiful green eyes. "A beating? A few pulled out fingernails? You're such a Neanderthal; it's always physical violence with you."

A quick glance down the table revealed that Joffrey, who had suddenly become quiet, had gone worrying pale. Margaery looked almost as pale (though that might have been largely due to her staying huddled up indoors crying and eating junk food for the past three days). Myrcella had her head bowed but, from her vantage point right next to her friend, Sansa could see that she was raptly watching Jaime through her eyelashes, as if she couldn't keep her eyes off him but didn't want anyone to know it. Sansa briefly met Tywin's cold stare and felt the weight of how inappropriate it was for her to be witnessing this family squabble, but she pulled her gaze away in time to see Jaime roll his eyes in an almost identical manner to his twin.

"As opposed to being sophisticated enough to get someone to carry out my physical violence for me?"

As if he hadn't bothered to speak at all, Cersei continued, "You can stop all this masculine posturing. You won't lay a hand on my son and we both know it."

"Like Robert didn't?" asked her brother. He let out a cruel laugh. "I seem to recall that Robert didn't give a fuck what you thought until you told him you'd have me do to him tenfold whatever he did to your precious little psychopath."

"Jaime…" began his twin, but Jaime ignored her.

"If I decide I want to do to Joffrey tenfold what he did to that girl, there's nothing you can do stop me. And we both know I want to."

Cersei began screaming, mostly threats that she would kill Jaime if he touched her son. Her son, for his part, shrieked almost as loudly as she did, letting them all know that he was Lord Baratheon and his uncle wouldn't dare and he hadn't done anything wrong. Also, he was Lord Baratheon, in case they hadn't heard it the first time.

Jaime ignored them both as he stalked out of the room.

Sansa was dying to know which girl Jaime had been talking about. Not Margaery, surely. That wouldn't make any sense, because Jaime had said what Joffrey "did to that girl," past tense, and as far as Sansa was aware he'd never done anything to Margaery to warrant the kind of retribution Jaime had threatened. And why wouldn't he have just called Margaery by name?

Later, after they had all silently filed out of the dining room (Sansa was so disappointed she hadn't got to take more than a bite of that delicious cake) and returned to their separate bedrooms (she was not disappointed to skip another late night moping with her friends), Sansa spent longer than she ever had before washing and shaving and exfoliating and moisturizing every inch of her body. She agonized over whether to put on makeup and what to do with her hair. She wanted to look her best, but Jaime hadn't seemed to mind her clean face that morning—her pale white skin was blessedly clear, other than a few freckles that had started to emerge just from the couple of hours she had spent in the sun that day. At night she usually kept her waist-length hair in two braids, but she didn't want to look like a little girl to him, not when he was going to be doing that to her, and she thought he would probably appreciate her hair loose. Even if she had to spend hours brushing out tangles later.

What to wear presented a whole other conundrum. She hadn't come to Casterly Rock expecting to get laid, so she hadn't packed anything remotely sexy. She opted for a pair of light pink hipster panties, which were lacking in color but still seemed a better choice than her sensible, if black, full coverage briefs. All her pajamas were basic cotton and at least one size too large for her, which had been on purpose when she'd bought them but hardly seemed like a good idea now that she needed sex appeal more than comfort. She put on a top with thin spaghetti straps and a pair of cotton shorts that at least had a strip of lace along the hem.

She found Jaime in the kitchen, exactly as they had planned. He couldn't come to her room, which was right between Myrcella and Margaery's and across the hall from Joffrey's. He had said that he couldn't have her wandering the halls of the Rock in the middle of the night trying to find his room, but if anyone saw them together in the kitchen they could play it off as both of them wanting a midnight snack and running into each other. Sansa found this explanation even more believable after they'd both spent dinner picking at their food, too uncomfortable to eat much.

He apparently had the same thought, as he was popping grapes into his mouth three at a time when Sansa walked in.

"I wasn't sure you'd come," he said around a mouthful. That normally would have irritated Sansa, but not in this case, for some reason. She seemed to have a Jaime-sized exception for all her usual rules and standards. "Want some?"

"I'd rather have some of that cake," she blurted before she stopped to think about it.

He let out a startled laugh and offered a smile at her flushed cheeks.

"Good call. I think I'll have some, too."

He disappeared through the door to the butler's pantry and, following the slam of a drawer, emerged a few seconds later with a glass cake plate in one hand. He was brandishing two forks in the other.

"Your cake, my lady," he teased as he set the platter in front of her and whipped off the dome lid with a flourish.

Sansa's mouth watered at the smell of chocolate, but she took the fork he gave her cautiously, watching curiously as he settled himself on the bar stool nearest her.

"Aren't we going to use plates?" she wondered aloud.

He answered by stabbing his fork directly into the middle of the cake.

"Nope," he clarified as he brought the heaping forkful to his mouth, leaving a trail of crumbs all the way along the countertop as he went. "I intend to show them just as much consideration as they showed us with that fucked up dinner party."

Sansa watched, torn, as he chewed and watched her back, waiting for her reaction.

"But Cella and Margaery didn't do anything wrong," she finally decided on pointing out. "Or your father."

"I doubt either of those girls will take so much as a bite of this after what Joffrey said. And my father doesn't eat sweets," he informed her, waving his fork dismissively as he went in for another piece. "He doesn't trust them. They make people too happy."

Sansa wasn't sure how much of that was an exaggeration or a poke at his father's expense, but she supposed it wasn't unreasonable to think that Tywin didn't like sweets. Some people didn't, she knew. She had never met one of them before, but she had heard they existed. Lord Lannister seemed like just the sort of type.

The next thing she knew, she was staring, cross-eyed, at Jaime's fork hovering an inch in front of her mouth.

"Come on, princess. You know you want to. Plus, I have it on good authority that this is Joffrey's favorite. He'll be furious if we ruin it."

She focused on his beautiful eyes and the daring, playful expression arranged across his striking features, which made him look much lighter than usual, and somehow younger. Sansa opened her mouth and allowed him to feed her a bite. He managed to get cake and thick chocolate icing all over her lower lip and chin, but fortunately some did make it inside her mouth. She savored the rich flavor, just the right amount of bitter dark chocolate and sweet, sugary frosting, even as she giggled and reached up reflexively to cover the mess on her face.

"Let me," he murmured, his voice suddenly several times deeper than it had been.

He reached for her face slowly, as if giving her time to back away or say no, then gently wiped his thumb across her chin. Sansa watched, enraptured, as he brought his thumb to his own mouth and made a show of sucking off the icing. The low-level ache between her legs, which she had endured all day as she thought about being with him tonight, revved up to a thousand. In the back of her mind she thought that, objectively, it should have been gross, but Sansa found that she had absolutely no objections when he leaned forward to draw her lip into his mouth, running his tongue along it and sucking gently to remove any left-over cake.

When he ran his tongue along the seam of her lips, Sansa parted them willingly and met his tongue with her own, hesitant but completely eager. When the angle changed abruptly as he rose from the stool and closed the distance between them, she automatically parted her legs to allow him room between them and found herself wrapping her arms around his neck to pull him even closer. When he pulled back, she let out a whine of frustration that she probably would have been mortified by if she hadn't been turned on out of her mind.

"Not here," he growled against her lips, though he evidently couldn't resist pressing in for another brief, deep kiss. "Come on, let's go."