After a season of the cast poking into a cringeworthy viral video, Teresa Giudice's fiancé finally shares the story behind the clip.
After a season of questions, Teresa Giudice's fiancé, Louie Ruelas, is finally providing answers -- and it all unfolds in ET's exclusive sneak peek at part 3 of The Real Housewives of New Jersey's season 12 reunion.
The season started with Teresa's co-stars discussing a now-viral video Louie made some years ago, shirtless on the beach, surrounded by other shirtless men, professing his love for this then-girlfriend for nearly two minutes.
"I'm coming home to see you, to get engaged and bring our family together and finally get married and have a life together," a sunburned Louie shouts at the camera in the clip. "I've been here for a week, these are my brothers ... I love you and I love our family together, and I love our children, and I hope your receive this message well. Thank you. I love you."
Just when his love-bomb proclamation sounds complete, Louie starts up again, continuing with, "Thank you for your time. I hope this hits your heart well and you understand where I'm coming from, and I hope to come home to you and be able to have a chance and opportunity to talk to you, and share with you my experience in my life."
"I love you, I'm sorry I made mistakes and held myself back, and held my truth inside, worried about other people around me" he adds as a man behind the camera eggs him on to say more. "I feel your pain. I'm sorry I put you through pain. Thank you for being patient with me, and seeing the man that I didn't see that you see and you saw in me. ... I'm gonna fix this. I'm gonna come home and show you and prove to you the man, the best version of myself that I am right now."
"I'm going to propose to you and get married," he exclaims after more prodding from the cameraman. "If that's OK with you."
"You know, when you were asked to explain the video, you claimed it was a breakup video, but in the video you actually proposed," host Andy Cohen notes on the reunion stage. "So, what was it?"
"I was in a relationship, it was toxic, and my business partner was going to this retreat," Louie explains. "So I said, 'Let's go.' And we weren't naked on the beach. We were in gym shorts, because they kept sending us in and out of the ocean. Going in and out of the ocean, they made the guys set intentions for their wives. I was a single guy, so I made this intention to this woman I was dating. I was trying to break up, but I didn't have the gut to do it. So when I went there, they made me commit to her and basically said, 'Stop making excuses,' and I committed to her."
"I wound up coming home and she gave me a prenup, asking for $1 million to get married," he says.
Watch it for yourself here:
Teresa's brother, Joe Gorga, immediately gives Louie a round of applause, cheering on his future brother-in-law. "I like that! That's how you explain the video!"
"That's amazing," Margaret Josephs chimes in. "And I just want to say, even though Teresa doesn't believe it, and her and I have different styles of getting ahead of things, I was trying to help you flip public opinion, because I didn't want you to f**king look bad. This is a very clear explanation and Louie is eloquent."
"Public opinion was not good," Margaret reiterates. "Unfortunately, it didn't get flipped."
All season long, Teresa took issue with Margaret asking questions about Louie's past and encouraging him to explain himself, but at the reunion, she says Margaret should've told her Louie didn't "explain it right" when he called it a breakup video.
"I don't know that you would've been receptive to that," Andy tells the RHONJ OG, a sentiment to which Margaret agrees.
"You would've had a temper tantrum at me," she tells her co-star. Andy then asks Teresa's sister-in-law, Melissa Gorga, to weigh in on what she believed Margaret's true intentions to be, with her questioning of Louie.
"I know how she is, she does get into people's business and I know that Teresa can't handle that, but she is going to help you," Melissa says.
"Believe me, I saw the stuff coming out and I said, 'We could make him look like a superstar!'" Margaret says. "But somebody was coaching him, 'cause you're like, deny, deny, deny!"
"You have it all wrong," Teresa spouts, cutting off Margaret. "Did I ever tell you to deny anything?"
"She never told me to deny anything," Louie notes. "What she kept saying to me was, 'You don't have to answer to anybody.' I kept saying to her, you have to let me speak. If I had a chance to speak, it'd have been different."
Andy then presses Louie on why he has so many exes who have come out of the woodwork to say "unkind things" about him, ranging from road-rage incidents to sexual demands, emotional and physical abuse and more. Viewers will have to tune into the reunion to see what Louie has to say, but according to Margaret, he continued to hold his own as he faced Andy's line of questioning.
"I think Louie is very rational," she told ET earlier this month. "I think he did a much better job at the reunion than he did on the season. Listen, I'd take Louie over Teresa any day of the week!"
The Real Housewives of New Jersey reunion wraps up on Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo.
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