He hadn't meant to kiss her. It had been the moment mixed with the alcohol, and if he would have kissed her he would have ended up regretting it.
Perhaps it was good that Matt had sent Rebecca to ruin the moment, to stop the kiss from happening.
But she hadn't been lying; she knew drunk guys did things like that.
So why did she feel so damn disappointed?
Sighing a little miserably, her gaze drifted over the crowd, looking for a familiar face—none of them really friendly, of course, but she may as well focus on something other than the ill-fated kiss that Aaron never meant to give her.
The face she landed on belonged to Emma, who wasn't looking at Julie, but at Aaron, a pensive look on her pretty face.
Anna was in Matt's lap, and she appeared to be getting very cranky as she held her body rigidly straight and whined, rubbing her eyes with her little fist.
Irritation flitted across Emma's face and then she turned, taking Emma from Matt and saying something to him, then grabbing Anna's diaper bag and making her way toward the exit.
The wedding reception was winding down, Julie realized.
She looked back over at Matt's table and saw him leaning back in his chair, gazing in the direction Emma had left. He looked like he was waiting for something, and after a few more seconds he slowly sat forward, but then he still appeared to be waiting, stealing another glance back. Finally he stood, glancing around casually and then looking directly at Julie—informing her that he had probably known she was there all along since he didn't have to search—and walking toward the table she was standing next to.
Breaking the eye contact, Julie started walking back over to her table, not waiting for Matt to approach her. Instead, she went to find Aaron, putting her drink down on the table and grabbing his hand, pulling him up and startling him.
"What's going on?" he asked, confused.
"I want my last dance," she said with a little smile. "People are beginning to leave, we can get out of here whenever you want guilt-free."
"Wow, you're certainly in a hurry," he remarked as he followed her out onto the floor.
"Do you want to be here any longer than we have to be?" she asked, raising her eyebrows.
"Not really," he said, shaking his head.
"Okay, then let's dance so we can get out of here."
As they went back out to the dance floor, they danced again just like they had the times before, but Julie was more reserved, and it really wasn't fun.
Before, even though she hadn't consciously been thinking of it that way, everything was romantic. There was slow music playing, the lights were just dim enough, couples gliding across the dance floor, Julie enjoying the gleam in Aaron's eye as he gazed down at her.
It wasn't romantic anymore, even as he held her in her arms—but at a careful distance. Perhaps he was being a gentleman—but she was finally realizing that maybe that wasn't what she wanted. Maybe—just maybe—she wanted to be looked at the way he had been looking at her before when he meant to kiss her, like she was the only woman in the room. Maybe she wanted to be held in his arms as they danced, and maybe she didn't want to deal with his damn emotional distance.
Hadn't she dealt with enough emotionally elusive men in her time that she should be able to spot one?
She wasn't sure when the desire had blossomed, but she was suddenly quite sure that she didn't see Aaron the way she had seen him before. When they had been dancing, she had wanted him to kiss her. And despite the interruption, she wanted him to still want to kiss her.
But the truth remained, cold and uncaring of her wants and desires: he only seemed to want to kiss her when he was drunk.
That was not good. She was at least wise enough to know that, even if it took him regretting trying to kiss her even when he was drunk.
"What's wrong?" Aaron asked, apparently noticing her change in mood.
She shook her head and said casually, "Nothing."
He narrowed his eyes. "Are you lying to me?" he gently nudged.
Shaking her head at how pointless it all was, she said, "Nope."
"You seem… distant," he remarked.
She wanted so badly to say, Yeah, it sucks, doesn't it? Instead she shook her head silently.