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What sort of marriage would they have if they fought over every aspect of their marital life? If he didn’t give up that mistress . . . If she took a lover?

Deep inside, she was praying that he had dismissed Gianna. Perhaps he wasn’t experiencing the same sensual hunger Torie was. Or perhaps he was, but it was directed at all women.

Or—a sickening thought—just at Gianna and her.

Florence reached the top of the aisle and dropped into a curtsy before Dominic, who bowed—and then kissed the top of her head. Her back to the audience, Clara scowled at Dominic before whisking Florence to the front row.

Torie’s hands were visibly trembling by the time she joined Dominic at the altar. She couldn’t help thinking of the dreams she cherished: visions of a man who would love her for what she was, rather than forgive her for what she wasn’t. Dominic had promised not to humiliate her ever again, but that was a long way from respecting her.

Throughout the marriage service, she kept peeking at the viscount’s face, hoping to see an emotion that she could interpret as loyalty. His eyes crackled with intensity as he listened to the minister, whose words she couldn’t comprehend.

Why listen? Vows were for people who planned . . . well, who were vowing fidelity. Which neither of them was.

“I do,” she said huskily, madly regretting her acceptance the moment she uttered the words. From the corner of her eye, she saw Dominic’s large frame relax. So he hadn’t been sure whether she would humiliate him by running screaming from the altar, playing her sister’s role but with a crueler twist.

The ironic thing was that she cared about Dominic too much to do that to him. She was a fool when it came to him. More than a fool.

The twins would still have loved her if she married the duke.

Too late now.

Thoughts chased each another around in her head like the horses of a carousel. She was going to have to stand up for herself, or she’d be walked on. Not deliberately, but because Dominic always thought he knew best. It was a constitutional part of his character. She could not allow herself to be squashed beneath the foot of a man who was so forceful and sure of himself.

“I do,” Dominic said in a deep rumble. She heard Florence give a little whoop from the front seat, where she sat beside Valentine.

Walking back down the aisle, Torie kept sucking in shaky breaths, telling herself that she had made her bed, and now she had to lie in it. Throughout history, countless women had survived loveless marriages. An Oxford professor had once regaled her with information about ancient ancestors who “lived in caves” and were uninterested in fidelity, or so he’d said.

She should have married him. He could barely afford a cave, let alone a mistress.

Sickeningly, she still faced the challenge of signing the parish book validating her wedding. Emily met her at the end of the aisle, murmuring congratulations as she discreetly handed over a reticule containing a bottle of ink.

Once Torie, Dominic, Clara, and Valentine joined the archbishop in the sanctuary, Dominic signed the parish book and stepped away. Torie moved forward with her ink bottle, but His Excellency turned obstinate, insisting that she sign the parish book in black ink rather than something as “newfangled” as blue.

Clara leaned toward the archbishop, and suddenly the man gave a little shriek and jumped away, as if he’d been stuck with a spit.

Torie quickly scrawled her name in blue. Acting as Dominic’s witness, Valentine smirked at her as he signed his in blue; Clara snatched her quill and did the same.

They arrived at her childhood home to find that Sir William had put on a lavish wedding reception complete with a cake soaked in marsala and covered with sugar icing, brandied chocolate, and every kind of breakfast food from buttered toast to coddled eggs.

Torie drifted around the drawing room, Florence hanging on one hand, accepting congratulations and the occasional hushed commiseration. She seemed to instinctively know where her husband was, enabling her to stay far away from him.

Would that be the future of their marriage? The thought was enough to make her despair.

When a second wave of food—ranging from stuffed crane to beefsteak—was shepherded in by the redoubtable Flitwick, Florence ran off to find Valentine, leaving Torie chatting with friends. Dominic was on the other side of the room, his eyes glinting at a hapless lord who was apparently daring to disagree with him. Later he began talking to a beautiful woman who looked vaguely Italian. Of course, not Gianna. There was no mixing between ladies and women of the demimonde except at Vauxhall.

He looked . . .

Well, he looked precisely as he always did. Broody and bloody-minded, iron-willed and—so handsome. Torie’s stomach curled into a painful knot, but she couldn’t let herself put a hand to her stomach in case it was taken as a sign of pregnancy.

“Time to leave,” Dominic said a half hour later, appearing at her shoulder. “Twilight has fallen. Valentine had three pieces of wedding cake along with a handful of olives, and I think he’s going to be very ill. Your motherly skills are required.”

Clara kissed her, glanced at Torie’s husband, and stamped away without bidding him farewell.

Dom’s eyes glittered derisively from beneath lowered lids.

“You make her nervous,” Torie said defensively.

“The woman’s addled,” he retorted. “Did you see that absurd reticule she was carrying? She stabbed the archbishop with it.”