“So send your swineherd to fetch them tomorrow,” Rothhaven said, taking a bite of a chicken sandwich. “My swineherd will assist, and I need never darken your door again—nor you, mine.” He sent her a pointed look, one that scolded without saying a word.

Althea’s brother Quinn had learned to deliver such looks, and his duchess had perfected the raised eyebrow to an art more delicate than that of the fan or glove.

While I am a laughingstock. A memory came to Althea, of turning down the room with a peer’s heir, a handsome, well-mannered man tall enough to look past her shoulder. The entire time they’d been waltzing, he’d been rolling his eyes at his friends, affecting looks of long-suffering martyrdom, and holding Althea up as an object of ridicule, even as he’d stalked her fortune and made remarks intended to flatter.

She had been blind to his game until her own sister had reported it to her in the carriage on the way home. The hostess had not intervened, no chaperone or gentleman had called the young dandy to account. He had thanked Althea for the dance and escorted her to her next partner with all the courtesy due the sister of a duke, and she’d been the butt of another joke.

“I cannot oblige you with an immediate removal of my sows, Your Grace,” Althea said. “My swineherd is visiting his sister in York, and won’t be back until week’s end. I do apologize for the delay, though if turning my pigs loose in your orchard has occasioned this introduction then I’m glad for it. I value my privacy too, but I am at my wit’s end, and must consult you on a matter of some delicacy.”

He gestured with half a sandwich. “All the way at your wit’s end? What has caused you to travel that long and arduous trail?”

Polite society. Wealth. Standing. All the great boons Althea had once envied and had so little ability to manage.

“I want a baby,” she said, not at all how she’d planned to state her situation.

Rothhaven put down his plate slowly, as if a wild creature had come snorting and snapping into the parlor. “Are you utterly demented? One doesn’t announce such a thing, and I am in no position to…” He stood, his height once again creating an impression of towering disdain. “I will see myself out.”

Althea rose as well, and though Rothhaven could toss her behind the sofa one-handed, she made her words count.