A Proper Lady (Regency Ladies #3)

Lady Cassandra Radcliff has suffered emotional blows, the latest of which involves her father's death. Now the role of the Duke of Sutherland goes to the next male heir - none other than Dougal Hunter. The man from Edinburgh never expected to inherit the title, so he is in dire need of some assistance to get acquainted with polite society and to help him sort out through all his new responsibilities. Who best to assist him than Lady Cassandra, who is reluctant and resentful of the very improper man who keeps mocking her and who doesn't show his new situation the respect it deserves.

Warning: There are explicit romantic scenes. For mature audiences (+18).
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Excerpt
Lady Cassandra Radcliff paced around the drawing room, straightening the flowers in the vases, checking that the paintings were aligned, fluffing the cushions…
Yes, she knew that housemaids had already taken care of those activities earlier in the morning, but she was waiting for someone to arrive and she knew everything had to be perfect. The good thing was that she had been educated to be a flawless duke’s daughter, and she knew exactly what to do, when to do it, and how to do it.
She took a deep breath in and stood straight. She didn’t even attempt to read a book or find something more productive to do—she knew she wouldn’t be able to concentrate.
Her black dress was flawless, and she wore a pearl necklace to not be so glum. After all, she would be meeting the new Duke of Sutherland, and she didn’t want him to be completely depressed the moment he set foot into his new estate in London.
Cassandra needed to be on the new Duke of Sutherland’s good graces; even if she was set to inherit a portion of her father’s wealth and her mother would be moving to an estate in the countryside, she had to do right by her family and by the title.
Cassandra’s father had died two months earlier during his sleep, in a sudden and painless way. It had taken Cassandra those two months to find her father’s male heir—a fourth cousin’s Scottish son, who had been in the Continent at the time of death.
Lady Radcliff, who had become a recluse since her son’s death three years prior, had been of no assistance in trying to set matters in order. And Cordelia, Cassandra’s younger sister, had recently given birth to her second child and had enough to deal with. Cordelia’s husband, Lord Nathaniel Pembroke, the Duke of Ashbury, had offered what assistance he could, but Cassandra was good at managing and dealing with problems, and this occasion was no different.
She heard a carriage pull up and looked out the window.
Her unlikely superior had arrived.