Until You Loved Me (Silver Springs #3)(107)

“Anyone could make a document like that,” Ellie told him, “and put whatever lab name and address on top, then turn it into a pdf file. There are samples of paternity test results online. I checked earlier, while you were on the phone, hoping I’d be able to spot an obvious fraud when these arrived.”

“And?”

“It’s not that easy. He did a nice job.”

“Good thing we’re double-checking him.”

“Yes, but I’m glad he doesn’t know that. If he did, I doubt he would’ve sent these, since they’ll provide strong evidence against him if he’s lying.”

That was probably why he’d tried to get the money without any documentation...

Hudson thumbed through the medical records Jones had sent along with the results of both DNA tests. “These look legit, too.”

“I wonder if he had Matisson ask Julia to request her medical records. Then he added in the pancreatic cancer diagnosis, as well as the medications.” She frowned. “On second thought, I bet he downloaded the sample medical record of a cancer patient from the internet and changed out all the personal information to make it coincide with Julia’s. How else would he know the names of the medications—and the dosages and so on?”

“Bastard,” Hudson grumbled.

“Julia might be involved. Have you considered that?”

“I have. But if she is, don’t you think they would’ve had her call me? A teary phone call from a suffering woman would’ve turned the screws on me. It might even have made me give in.”

“True. And she sent her father to prison, so chances are they no longer have any contact. That makes me think she’s not involved.”

“If she’s not, but she is my mother, I’ll send her some money, anyway. After what she’s been through, I’m sure she could use a break.”

Ellie smiled up at him.

“What?” he said.

“You have such a soft heart.”

He gave her a mock glare. “What do you mean? I’m tough as nails.”

She laughed as she stood, and he realized how much bigger their baby was getting as she walked over to him.

“Garrison is going to be enormous,” he said.

“Don’t scare me like that,” she responded as he kissed her.

She turned off the TV and talked him into going to bed, but he was too preoccupied to do anything except hold her until she fell asleep. After that, he quietly left the room and went downstairs. So much had changed in the past six months. And so much more was going to change. He’d be married, become a father. He’d also become a son if Matisson was his father—not that he viewed that as a positive thing.

He paced and played some pool, watched TV, even swam, trying to galvanize himself for the results. He was up all night, so when he heard Ellie calling out to him the following morning, he was exhausted but prepared for the worst. Maybe that was why he could hardly believe it when she found him as he was coming down the hall, threw her arms around his neck and said, “The DNA test came back negative, Hudson! Whoever smoked that cigarette—and I’m 90 percent sure it was Matisson—is not your father. They’re lying about everything! The fact that Julia Matisson happened to have her baby the same year you were born—and that it was a boy—was just a coincidence they capitalized on.”

Hudson’s knees nearly gave out on him. He’d been so sure he’d have to face the opposite. There’d have to be a third test, of course, one to confirm the results they’d received a few minutes ago. But now he had hope. Even with the uncertainty regarding whether that cigarette butt really belonged to Matisson, he believed the LA test to be more reliable than anything that came from Jones. “So what happened to her baby?”

“Who can say? Maybe he was stillborn as Matisson claims.”

“Or Matisson killed him as the cops suspect. Smothered the baby before it could even cry.”

“That’s a sad thought, but a possibility.”

He closed his eyes in relief.

“Hudson?” she said.

“What?”

“Do you still want to marry me? Maybe you should reconsider, now that—”

He caught her face between his hands. “Are you kidding? I want you to be my wife more than ever now that I don’t have to worry I’ll be an embarrassment to you.”

“I’ll always be proud of you, no matter what,” she told him.





Epilogue

Hudson was sweating despite the fact that it was cold in the hospital. Ellie was sweating, too. He could see beads of moisture on her upper lip as he fed her ice chips—which was all the doctor would allow her to have. She’d been in labor for twenty-four hours, and the pains were getting more intense. Watching her suffer killed him, made him wish he could do more than stand idly by, worrying that something terrible might happen to her or their child before this night was through. Ellie had become such an integral part of his life. He’d never dreamed he’d like being married as much as he did, couldn’t imagine having to go on without her.

He told himself he was overreacting. People had babies every day. And yet...Ellie’s delivery was turning into a long, agonizing process.

“I think you should give her a Cesarean,” he told their obstetrician, Dr. Billinger, when she came in to check on Ellie. Ellie’s parents had been there with them until midnight. They’d returned to Miami a month earlier and had come to California for the baby’s birth almost ten days ago—since Ellie had shot past her due date by a week. But when the nurse told them Ellie hadn’t even dilated to three yet, that the baby probably wouldn’t come until morning, they’d gone home to his place to get some rest.