He didn't want her getting hurt, he didn't want her getting attached to someone like him, because that way lay hurt. But maybe she was already attached. More to the point, maybe he was. Maybe just having her around him again was enough because in truth Jaime wanted to take her in his arms, hold her and kiss her and tell her he would protect her. He loved Cersei, he always would, But Isabela was so free and giving with her heart when she was around him. And he loved that too. How had he found himself in a world more complicated than anything in Westros, and how had he let himself fall for a pirate of all things.
And he'd been cruel to her. Cold and heartless and mean to the boy who had been his son. Perhaps the only child in his life that had grown up without the stigma he and Cersei had given to their own three. And he knew just how much it had hurt Isabela, she was not afraid of telling him. "You're right, I was cruel to him. And to you. I treated you abominably and I did it so Cersei would never learn the truth. I was scared of her finding out I'd lain with another woman and scared of her hating me for it. You know I didn't plan it Isabela, I had no intention of taking you to bed that night, but things...changed between us didn't they."
Gods help him she was sitting beside him and he still wanted her. He made very sure to keep him hands at his side, lightly clenched and gazed into her eyes, not drifting once to her chest, or those legs that had so often thrilled him.
"What might I do so that things are good between us? Or at the very least better between us. I owe you, more than that. I truly do care for you and I want things to be alright again between us. Tell me how to see to that?" That was of course the thing with Jaime. For all he could command a battle line, for all he could be the Lion of Lannister. He was often unable to work out how to deal with women. Cersei told him what she wanted and he gave it to her to the best of his ability. Isabela was different. And he didn't know what to do with that.