Matt scoffed and shook his head, but it was Aaron she was looking at. "Wow, Aaron."
Aaron dropped his gaze to the floor, then averted his gaze a little uncomfortably off to the side before finally meeting her gaze, saying, "Not… entirely."
"About which part?" she asked.
"I'll make it easy," Matt said. "He likes to make me out to be the biggest asshole in the world because of rumors about me and his girlfriend—rumors that weren't even true, and yet because of Aaron and Emma they ruined Shannon's career, their relationship, and threatened my marriage—and I'm sure he has given you a veritable field day about your affair with me, but you know what you don't hear about? Aaron and Emma—the revenge for the fictitious affair."
"Is that… true? You and Emma?" she asked, unable to keep the appalled look off her face as she asked Aaron, waiting to hear his denial.
"I told you, Julie, that you might hear things about me this weekend…"
"I don't care what I heard, Aaron, I'm asking you. Did something really… happen between you two?"
His prolonged silence was really enough of an answer for her, but she still held a little thread of hope until the moment when he finally bowed his head slightly and said, "Yes."
Feeling as if the rug had been pulled from right beneath h
er feet, she staggered a little, leaning back against the wall.
Images of Emma in the bathroom came swimming into her head, a million questions surfacing from the new knowledge about why she would even do that.
Emma and Aaron?
She couldn't stand the thought, and she wished that she could just erase the knowledge from her mind.
"You slept with your brother's wife?" she reiterated.
Sighing, Aaron said, "No, it didn't… get that far. It almost got that far, but…"
Her previous thoughts resurfaced in her mind, the thoughts about how she wouldn't be the perfect revenge on Matt, Emma would.
Apparently Aaron had thought of that already.
"And you have been… so hard on me," she said, shaking her head. "I thought that you thought I was the worst person alive because of what I had done, and you… had done virtually the same thing."
"It wasn't like that, Julie," Aaron said, but his voice was so low and his expression was so dismal that she didn't quite believe him. "It was… we were both… hurt."
"Ugh, no," she said, closing her eyes against the images that emerged in her head of Emma and Aaron taking comfort in each other. "No, I—you… you're a hypocrite," she finally managed. "You're a hypocrite and… you shouldn't have let me hear this from Matt. If you were so concerned with me hearing about this then you should have come clean to me, you should have been the one to tell me this story, but instead you sat back and waited, pushing me away and keeping yourself at a distance until your brother finally ratted you out."
"This is why I tried to warn you, Julie. I didn't want this to happen, but…"
"But you knew it would," she said. "And yet… you let it."
"How could I stop it, Julie? Yes, this is why I kept my distance; I didn't want you to… get involved and then get slapped in the face with this," Aaron stated.
"Because you had an affair with your brother's wife?" she asked, staring at him. "That's why you didn't kiss me? That really is the big reason you always push me away?"
"Yes," he said, finally coming alive. "I have skeletons too, Julie. They're not… the way that he made them sound to you just now, but…"
"I just can't believe that you could give me such a hard time about this when you…" Julie trailed off, shaking her head in disbelief.
"What have you done, Matt?" Julie heard softly.
Matt's gaze shot to Emma's lovely figure, emerging from the reception where Aaron had just come from.
Looking completely confused, Matt managed, "You… took Anna to bed."
Emma's eyes flashed cold, and for a split second, Julie saw hatred there. But she cleared it away, stepping slowly and deliberately toward Matt. "What the hell is wrong with you?"