Until You Loved Me--A Novel Read online

  New York Times bestselling author Brenda Novak returns to Silver Springs

  Sometimes starting over means finding everything you’ve been missing...

  After catching her fiancé cheating—with another man—usually straitlaced, workaholic scientist Ellie Fisher liberates her wild side just long enough to indulge in a passionate one-night stand with a tall, dark stranger she meets at a trendy Miami bar. Embarrassed by her recklessness, she ducks out the following morning without learning the guy’s full name, something that shouldn’t have been a problem...until a pregnancy test turns positive.

  Being a professional football player, Hudson King has always been cautious around women. But this one had been different—so disinterested in his celebrity, so convincingly into him. When Ellie tracks him down, claiming she’s carrying his baby, he’s stunned. And more than a little betrayed.

  But after growing up as an orphan, he’ll do anything to stay involved in his child’s life, so he urges Ellie to move to Silver Springs, where they can co-parent. Hudson has a lot of love to give, certainly enough for his child, and when their initial spark reignites, perhaps for Ellie, too...

  Praise for the novels of New York Times bestselling author Brenda Novak

  “Once you visit Silver Springs, you’ll never want to leave.”

  —Robyn Carr, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Brenda Novak is always a joy to read.”

  —Debbie Macomber, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Brenda Novak doesn’t just write fabulous stories, she writes keepers.”

  —Susan Mallery, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “The author deftly integrates topics such as coming to terms with one’s past and the importance of forgiveness into another beautifully crafted, exceptionally poignant love story.”

  —Library Journal on Discovering You

  “This Heart of Mine had such beautiful details that it captured my full attention—and had me sniffling and smiling while waiting to board my plane.”

  —First for Women

  “Another engrossing addition to Novak’s addictive series.”

  —Library Journal on This Heart of Mine (starred review)

  “With great sensitivity and an exquisite flair for characterization, Novak explores the ideas of redemption, forgiveness, and the healing power of love. This Heart of Mine is a potently emotional, powerfully life-affirming contemporary romance.”

  —Booklist (starred review)

  Booklist voted This Heart of Mine one of their Top 10 Romances in 2015.

  Also by Brenda Novak

  NO ONE BUT YOU

  FINDING OUR FOREVER

  THE SECRETS SHE KEPT

  A WINTER WEDDING

  THE SECRET SISTER

  THIS HEART OF MINE

  THE HEART OF CHRISTMAS

  COME HOME TO ME

  TAKE ME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS

  HOME TO WHISKEY CREEK

  WHEN SUMMER COMES

  WHEN SNOW FALLS

  WHEN LIGHTNING STRIKES

  IN CLOSE

  IN SECONDS

  INSIDE

  KILLER HEAT

  BODY HEAT

  WHITE HEAT

  THE PERFECT MURDER

  THE PERFECT LIAR

  THE PERFECT COUPLE

  WATCH ME

  STOP ME

  TRUST ME

  DEAD RIGHT

  DEAD GIVEAWAY

  DEAD SILENCE

  COLD FEET

  TAKING THE HEAT

  EVERY WAKING MOMENT

  And look for Brenda Novak’s next Silver Springs novel

  RIGHT WHERE WE BELONG

  available soon from MIRA Books.

  Brenda Novak

  Until You Loved Me

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome to Silver Springs, population 5,000! I love writing this new series, mostly because I enjoy working with wounded heroes, and the boys ranch at the edge of my fictional Southern California town (located about ninety minutes northwest of Los Angeles) supplies many of those. Hudson King, the hero of this novel, was abandoned the day he was born—in Bel Air, of all places, one of the richest areas in the state. No one can say who left him or why, but his fortunes have changed dramatically over the years. He’s no longer an unwanted orphan. As one of the most gifted quarterbacks in the NFL, he’s achieved what most men can only dream about. He has everything. Almost. He still craves answers, has to find the person or people who left him to die all those years ago so he can learn why. Problem is...what he finds out makes him wish he’d never solved the mystery. Good thing he has just the person to stand in his corner with scientist Ellie Fisher...

  I love to hear from my readers. If you’re on Facebook, you can find me at www.Facebook.com/brendanovakauthor. You might even be interested in joining my online book group, which consists of over 6,000 book fanatics! We have so many fun things going on—group T-shirts and sweatshirts, personalized and autographed bookmarks, monthly “professional reader boxes,” a birthday program, an annual “in person” event, a commemorative pin for anyone who’s read more than fifty Novak novels, and more! You can learn all about it on my website (www.brendanovak.com). Just click on the Book Group page (which is where you can also find the link to sign up). And while you’re there, be sure to add your name to my mailing list. I’d love to be able to notify you of sales, new books and other news.

  To happily-ever-after...

  Brenda Novak

  To my husband, who’s listened and offered feedback as I’ve read every single one of the sixty novels I’ve written aloud to him. (Sometimes he’s heard them two or three times!) That’s what a real hero is like.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from Right Where We Belong by Brenda Novak

  Prologue

  Wincing against the glare of the sun that slanted through his front windshield, the man drove slowly through Bel Air, California. There was so much money in this area. He couldn’t even afford to pay the rent on his dumpy one-bedroom apartment and yet these people owned estates that sprawled over half an acre. Didn’t seem fair.

  The baby he’d put in the seat next to him—only a few hours old and wrapped in a tattered blanket—began to squirm. It wasn’t in a carrier; he didn’t own one. He wasn’t about to spend good money on something he wouldn’t need.

  “Don’t you cry,” he muttered under his breath. “Don’t you dare cry.” He couldn’t tolerate that sound—it was like nails scraping down a chalkboard. He had to get rid of the child before it started to make noise. Noise would draw to
o much attention.

  He’d intended to take it to the far corner house. He’d been to that mansion twice before and thought the woman who lived there might be empathetic enough to take in an abandoned baby. But the needy infant was already waking up, so he pulled over immediately, looked both ways on the quiet summer street and grabbed the squirming bundle.

  It took only a few seconds to stash the newborn under the closest privacy hedge. He didn’t dare go any closer to the house surrounded by that hedge, couldn’t waste the time or he’d risk being seen. The neighborhood was quiet in midafternoon, but there were always service people coming and going...

  He heard the baby start to fuss, which only made him move faster. After jumping back into his vehicle, he took off.

  1

  Thirty-two years later

  “You look miserable.”

  Ellie Fisher forced a smile for her oldest friend. “What? No, I’m not miserable at all!” She had to shout over the music pulsing through the air and reverberating off the walls and ceiling. She’d never understood why, in a place designed for singles to meet and become acquainted, the music had to be so loud. A hundred twenty decibels made it almost impossible to have a conversation and had to be damaging their hearing, but she didn’t say that. She knew how Amy, her friend since early childhood, and Amy’s friend Leslie, whom she’d just met tonight, would react. Besides, after the emotional trauma she’d been through in the past week, she wouldn’t have felt much better anywhere else. “I’m having a great time!”

  Amy pursed her lips. “Sure you are.”

  After being inseparable in grade school, she and Amy had grown apart in middle school and taken very different paths. Amy had been the stereotypical cheerleader—popular, outgoing and fun—and had opted for cosmetology school instead of college. She now worked at an expensive hair boutique in Brickell, a neighborhood in downtown Miami. Ellie had never received the same amount of attention, especially from boys, but until recently she hadn’t cared about that. She’d always preferred her studies to parties, had been her high school valedictorian and was accepted into Yale, where she’d done her undergraduate as well as postgraduate work. Since leaving school, she’d been determined to overcome the immunology challenges associated with finding a cure for diabetes—her favorite aunt had lost a leg to the dreaded disease—and now she worked at one of the foremost research facilities in the world, which just happened to be here in Miami, where she’d been born. But thanks to that early bond, she and Amy would always be friends. Ellie had never been more grateful for her than during the past week, since Amy was the one who’d been there when Ellie’s world fell apart.

  “It’s true.” Ellie glanced from Amy to Leslie as if to say “Here we are, sitting at a tiny table in one of South Beach’s most popular nightclubs. What’s not to love?”

  Amy rolled her eyes. “I know you too well to believe that. But I’m not letting you cut out early, so don’t start checking the time on your phone. I’ve invited a couple of friends to come and meet you, remember?”

  Ellie remembered, but Amy hadn’t mentioned any names. Ellie got the impression it was because she didn’t know which friend would show up—that she’d simply gone through her male clients and other contacts and invited anyone who might be available. “I wasn’t checking the time,” Ellie said.

  Amy scowled. “I saw you!”

  “I was looking to see if my parents texted me! They should’ve arrived in Paris by now.” Ellie wished she’d gone with them, but by the time her life had imploded, they’d had their travel plans in place, and it’d been too late to get a plane ticket. They’d be teaching in France for the next year, though. Once she finished the clinical trials she was working on, she hoped to fly over and meet up with them. Now that she wouldn’t be going on her honeymoon, she had enough vacation days to stay for three weeks. Surely visiting Paris would provide a better distraction. Hanging out with Amy didn’t seem to be helping.

  “Your parents will be fine,” Amy said. “You need to loosen up, have a few drinks and start dancing. Forget about everything, including that bastard Don and the man he cheated on you with.”

  Ellie didn’t think she could get drunk enough to forget about Don. Three days ago, she’d caught him in bed with Leonardo Stubner, a member of the administration staff where they worked. She’d have to face them both—as she had on Wednesday, Thursday and today—when she returned to the Banting Diabetes Center on Monday. And that wasn’t the worst of it. Since her shocking discovery, he and Leo had come out of the closet and declared their love for each other, adding another level of humiliation to her suffering by making it all public. Half of their coworkers felt so sorry about the pressure they’d been under to hide their sexuality that they were praising them for having the courage to finally make “the big reveal.” The other half, those who were critical of their deception, didn’t dare speak out for fear of being accused of being unsympathetic, homophobic or both. One way or the other, almost everyone she knew was talking about Ellie and her situation and forming an opinion.

  After hearing what Amy had just said, Leslie leaned forward, finally showing a spark of interest in Ellie. “Your fiancé cheated on you with another man?”

  Ellie squirmed under Leslie’s horrified regard. When Amy had said they were taking Ellie out to get her mind off a broken engagement, Leslie had barely reacted. But the circumstances of her failed relationship made Ellie that much more pathetic. When Ellie caught her fiancé with his “best friend,” whom he’d known since college—Don was the one who got Leo hired at the BDC—she’d also come face-to-face with the realization that all the “golfing” trips the two had taken since she and Don started dating hadn’t been as innocent as she’d been led to believe.

  The one man who’d told her he wanted to spend forever with her hadn’t really been attracted to her in the first place. He’d been using her as a cover so he wouldn’t become estranged from his ultrareligious parents.

  That hurt more than her lost dream of having a family.

  But the fact that she was ill at ease in a nightclub wasn’t Don’s fault. She’d never felt comfortable in large groups, didn’t consider herself particularly adept at the kind of social interaction they required. She’d been too devoted to getting her PhD in biomedical engineering—and following that with a postdoctoral fellowship at the BDC, where she’d met Don, a fellow scientist—to have much time for clubbing, so she’d had little experience.

  She shouldn’t have let Amy drag her here, she decided as she gazed around. But maybe one of Amy’s friends would show up and make her feel like less of a loser. Nothing else had worked since Don’s betrayal, so she forced herself to hold out hope. If she didn’t make some effort to recover and move on, even if it resulted in only a very short rebound relationship, she’d die an old maid, as her grandmother would’ve put it. That had never seemed more of a possibility than now. Her thirtieth birthday loomed ahead, but instead of planning her wedding, as she’d anticipated, she’d be doing all she could to continue her research while bumping into her ex-fiancé and his lover on a daily basis.

  A man from across the room came toward them. With his sandy-colored hair swept up off his forehead, he was attractive in a frat-boy way—well built and preppy, which was a look she found attractive.

  “Mind if I join you?” he asked.

  Frat Boy immediately singled out Amy—not that Ellie could blame him. Dressed in a short, tight-fitting black dress, six-inch stilettos and smoky makeup with bright red lipstick, Amy oozed sex appeal. So did Leslie, for that matter. Due mainly to Amy’s insistence, even Ellie had had a complete makeover and was dressed in a similar fashion, except her dress was white and dipped low in the back instead of the front—the only concession Amy would allow Ellie’s natural modesty.

  “You need to get laid. That’s what you need,” her friend had said when she’d balked at wearing t
he skimpy lingerie she had on under her dress or complained about the height of the heels Amy had pressed on her. If someone did ask her to dance, she’d probably turn an ankle, which was hardly conducive to hooking up later. Then her first Brazilian would definitely not be worth the shocking pain.

  Amy looked Frat Boy up and down before widening her smile. “Sure. It’ll save me the trouble of searching for you when I’m ready to leave.”

  He obviously liked that response. Ellie had to admit it was evocative. She almost brought up the notes app on her phone so she could jot it down—except she was fairly certain that line wouldn’t come off so smoothly if she ever attempted to use it. Flirting sounded silly coming from her. She loved sarcasm, had always traded put-downs with her father, but she doubted that talent would impress other men.

  With some effort because of the throng of people who filled the club, the man located a chair and dragged it over before introducing himself as Manny. He made small talk for a few minutes. Then he waved over his friend, a shorter, stockier version of himself, who’d been getting drinks at the bar.

  Manny explained that they were both commercial real estate agents with a local firm and introduced his friend as Nick. Nick focused on Leslie, since Manny already had dibs on Amy, making Ellie the third wheel she’d expect to be in a situation like that. She tried to contribute to the conversation but found herself peeking at her phone when Amy wasn’t looking. Not only was she uncomfortable, she was bored. But if she tried to get a taxi, Amy would remind her of the “friends” who were coming to meet her.

  As the two couples got up to dance, leaving Ellie alone at the table, she let out a long sigh and flagged down a waitress. “Bring me three shots of vodka,” she said.

  Maybe if she forced herself to get buzzed, the rest of the night would pass in a merciful blur. The alcohol wasn’t good for her liver. As a scientist, she couldn’t help acknowledging that. But as far as she was concerned, it was vital for her poor aching heart.

  * * *