A Fiery Dalliance

XLIII

"I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life." Rita Rudner

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XLIII.

"I never would have wagered on this day coming. Not for ten thousand pounds."

Joe was startled as the sound of a familiar voice suddenly came from his right. He was standing at the altar, and was already sweating, and so a surprise was not welcome. But when Joe turned his head, he was shocked to see Reverend Thomas standing beside him, bible in hand, ready to perform the wedding ceremony.

"Vicar!" remarked Joe, his voice shaky with nerves. "What are you doing here?"

"Your future father-in-law's request," Reverend Thomas replied. "I believe the duke finds it to be a capital joke that I be the one to marry the two of you after you both nearly sent me into the pit of insanity." He shook his head as he tsked.

Joe could vividly hear his old schoolmaster's voice in the elderly man before him, shouting at both he and Perrie, mainly Joe, to stop attempting to kill the other. If he concentrated hard enough, he could still feel the crack of the cane on his knuckles. At the time, he had felt that every one of those beatings was worth it if it meant he had gotten to Perrie. Joe still held the same belief, as every one of those beatings had led them to this moment.

"I think the key word you need to treasure there, Vicar, is nearly," Ed mused from beside Joe with a wry smile.

A minute smile teased Reverend Thomas' lips as he sighed, and uttered, "Well, I am certainly pleased that this marriage will mean that you and Lady Perrie will stop your nonsense. I hope that there will some peace in the Ashwood village. I hear you are to take Althorpe Cottage as your home."

Joe did not have the heart to tell the vicar that there was not a chance on earth that he and Perrie would ever fully stop their 'nonsense'. They were both stubborn and passionate individuals who loved to spark fire in the other. The attempted murders were a safer bet. They would probably end. Probably.

Perrie's entire family were gathered in the small London church, occupying the pews on both sides of the aisle. It did not affect Joe as much as one would think it might that he had no one to invite. He and Ed both had already been so welcomed into this family. He knew Perrie's immediate family well, and though there were several members he had only just been introduced to in the previous few days, Joe felt positive for one of the first times in his life that everything would be alright.

There were no other guests besides Perrie's family. It was a private affair. Cecily had organised it this way, so that she could be the one to orchestrate whatever details were passed on to the aristocracy. It certainly was a story that had all of London abuzz. Rumours, of course, circulated as the haste of the eldest daughter of the Duke of Ashwood's marriage. But Cecily was in utter control of them all.

Joe had also read his own name in the papers more times than he had ever thought that he would in the past week. There was great curiosity about the man who had secured that great prize that would have been Perrie Beresford come her debut the following year. And who was Joe but the second son of an irrelevant viscount? That was what one of the newspapers had said.

"I find newspapers like these are best repurposed as cloths in the privy," Cecily had joked wickedly, to which she received a shocked admonishment from Grace.

Nobody, not even the Beresfords, were above criticism and comment, but in observing how well they supported one another, and security they had in each other, Joe knew that he would learn to disregard the voices of those who did not matter.