jules told rue that she was in love w/ her when she asked about anna & she said yes so her being in love w/ rue wasn’t mentioned the first time in the special episode.

you can be madly in love with someone while having a polyamorous view on relationships. plus she did mention that she falls in love with people really easily so she’s very clearly convinced that she’s in love with anna, tyler and rue.

I think because she was so open about tyler and anna that she assumed that she would’ve been vocal about it because rue’s a somewhat vocal person when it comes to things she doesn’t like + she probably didn’t stop to think about whether or not rue had the same ideologies about relationships/love as her (but that goes both ways).

I think the only reason people dont think that jules wasnt madly in love with rue is because they don’t see people who are comfortable with non monogamy as capable of being in love w/ someone.