It Must Be Your Love (The Sullivans #11)(23)

Darn it, why was she thinking of him again?

“So what’s up?” Nicola asked, bringing Mia back to the question she’d been wanting to ask.

“How do you and Marcus make things work so well? Not just that,” she added before Nicola could respond, “but you make it look so easy. And I know it can’t possibly be, with your busy touring and recording schedule and the demands of this vineyard.”

“No,” Nicola agreed with a small smile, “it definitely isn’t easy. And I don’t know how much you know about our relationship, but we were a mess at first. A total mess, actually. I was so adamant that he couldn’t handle the circus of my life that I literally kicked him out of it, even when it was the very last thing I really wanted because I was already head over heels in love with him. But you know Marcus.” Nicola’s face softened even further with a look of pure love. “When he made up his mind that he could most definitely deal with the circus, he was suddenly showing up at all of my shows all over the country. How was I supposed to resist focus and determination like that? Especially when it proved how much he was willing to change his own life for me. I’m not going to lie and say that figuring out how to make our two schedules work together is always a perfectly smooth ride, but I’ll take a few bumps in the road over being without him, anytime.” With that, she popped a grape into her mouth, then asked Mia a question of her own. “Does this question have anything to do with this bad news man of yours, who I’m going to assume is super hot, too?”

“Not just bad news. Old news,” Mia said with a careless wave of her free hand. But obviously feeling her tense at the blatant lie, Jackie made a face in her sleep and shifted in Mia’s arms. “Sorry, baby girl,” she whispered before turning her gaze back up to Nicola. “I did meet a cute guy on the flight out here, though.”

Nicola raised an eyebrow, clearly not about to fall for the diversion Mia was trying to throw at her. “If it takes me all weekend, I’ll get you to spill the details on your secret hot guy. Although, speaking of hot guys, I just got some great news about a guest who told me he can come to the wedding tomorrow, after all. I’ll give you a hint—he’s one of the most amazing rockers on the planet.”

Even as Mia tried to be rational and think about the odds against his name coming out of Nicola’s mouth, she couldn’t stop a heavy feeling from coming over her. Her mouth felt dry, and it took every ounce of self-control to keep from fidgeting so that she didn’t wake up the baby in her arms.

“Ford Vincent!” Nicola was so excited that she didn’t notice the way all the blood drained out of Mia’s face. “I’m such a huge fan that I always get a little giddy every time I listen to him sing, and he’s also really nice.”

Ford made other big stars like Nicola giddy. But Mia was anything but giddy right now.

More like sick to her stomach.

Of course Ford and Nicola would know each other. They were in the same business, for God’s sake. Now that she thought about it, hadn’t the two of them played some shows together before Nicola had met Marcus?

“Ford is coming here?” Mia’s voice sounded hollow to her own ears. “To the winery? For your wedding?”

One dumb question after another kept falling from her lips, but she couldn’t stop any of them. Not when she felt like she was barely keeping it together. If not for the baby on her lap, she might have jumped up off the couch to go running like little Emma through the vineyard.

Nicola was giving Mia a strange look when Sophie’s ears finally picked up on Ford’s name. “Wait a minute,” she said, echoing Mia’s questions for everyone to hear, “are you telling us that Ford Vincent is coming here for the wedding? How did I not know that?”

“He couldn’t come at first because of a scheduling conflict,” Nicola explained. “He called my cell yesterday afternoon out of the blue and asked if the invitation was still open.”

“Yesterday afternoon. Of course that’s when he would have called,” Mia said, almost to herself. There was no way that call could have been a coincidence. He hadn’t come after her in Miami five years ago, but now he wouldn’t take get the hell out of my life for an answer. Clearly, everything always had to be on his terms, and if he wasn’t the one to say goodbye, then those words didn’t count.

Again, Nicola frowned in Mia’s direction, but Sophie’s twin, Lori, had walked over to the group by then. Nicknamed Naughty to Sophie’s Nice, Lori was wearing a cowboy hat and the cutest red cowboy boots with her short, strapless red dress. The women in the group were beautiful, but of them all, Lori was the most immediately striking. Whether she was dancing on stage or getting dirty with the pigs on the farm she shared with her husband, Grayson, people simply couldn’t take their eyes off her.

“You’re not going to believe who’s coming to the wedding,” Sophie told her twin. “Ford Vincent!”

Mia was shocked when Lori gasped. Actually gasped. “Don’t mess with me, Soph.” She turned to Nicola with big eyes. “Is this for real? Is he really going to be here?”

Nicola was nodding and about to say something more about it when Mia simply couldn’t take it anymore. “I’m just not getting what the big deal is about him. So he has some pretty good songs, but all of you have totally great men already.”