Beautiful Mistakes

It was hard to smile for the woman, who obviously expected a normal level of pleasure from someone receiving such a beautiful bouquet, but she knew before she looked at the card who it was going to be from.

There was only one person who would have sent her roses.

What she didn't know was why the asshole thought it was appropriate to send his ex-mistress flowers to his brother's apartment when his wife surely knew nothing about it.

"Beautiful," Aaron murmured, but he looked anything but enthused.

Sliding a sideways glance his way, she sighed a little as she took the flowers, hesitating before she plucked the card out.

"They are beautiful, aren't they?" the woman said on a sigh, looking at the flowers almost dreamily.

Julie kept her expression carefully blank as she read the simple card.

Julie-

I was thinking of you.

I miss you.

-Matt

Shaking her head, Julie glanced up to see Aaron discreetly reading the card out of the corner of his eye, and she quickly tilted it away.

His gaze jumped to hers then, and she felt as if she had been caught, even though she had done nothing wrong.

Maybe because there was something like accusation in his eyes?

No, wrong word. It wasn't accusation…

He looked like he had been proven right—not the smug way he had been in the car, but like he was almost disappointed that he was right.

Acting on pure spontaneity, Julie pasted a smile on her face and pushed the roses back toward the woman at the desk.

"I'll tell you what, why don't you take these roses home?"

The woman raised startled eyes to Julie's. "Excuse me?"

"You like them, don't you? They're pretty. You can have them—a token of appreciation for always being so friendly." Then she picked them up and handed them to the woman. "Thank you."

"Oh, I couldn't…" the woman said, but she was blushing with pleasure.

"I want you to have them," Julie said brightly. "Trust me, I work with people all the time, I know you deserve them—people aren't always a joy to be around. Besides, if you don't take them, I'm going to haul them straight up those stairs and throw them in the trash, so you might as well put them in a vase on your table or something."

"Well, that's very nice of you, thank you," the woman said, smiling as she looked at the roses.

"Anytime. And… if in the future you ever get flowers from someone named Matt again, keep 'em.—I'll just throw them away."

The woman smiled and stole a glance at Aaron, probably reading the situation very inaccurately, but she didn't say anything else.

"Good night," Julie called with a wave as she walked toward the elevator, Aaron slowly trailing behind.

This time it was Julie racing to the elevator and pushing the button, thinking it couldn't possibly get there soon enough.

"You didn't have to do that," Aaron told her, looking up at the numbers that told them which floor the elevator was on.

"I know," she said casually. "I didn't want them."

"Why?" he asked.