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Sophronie and Waycross always did. No matter how determined she was to not react to the duke’s deliberate goading, as predictably as a match touched to tinder burst into flames, she lost her temper. What was more, she couldn’t deny a surge of triumph when irritation sparked in his stormy eyes. There was something most satisfying about getting beneath the severe duke’s sun-browned skin.

The coach bounced and squeaked as one of the stocky drivers descended to open the conveyance’s door.

“Pet, I know you and the duke have been at cross purposes. But I believe Waycross is a decent man. An upstanding and honorable man.” Papa winked. “You won’t like hearing it, Roni, but the pair of you are very much alike in many ways.”

The door swung open.

“Are you daft, Papa?” Sophronie couldn’t help her disrespect or raised pitch. Shock and surprise had a way of sending one’s voice to the ceiling and making one forget one’s manners. “I am nothing like the Duke of Waycross. He’s a growly, cantankerous bear. His teeth and claws are always bared and ready to draw blood. Usually mine.”

“Sophronie.” Papa’s tone turned stern, a warning in his tenor. “That is beneath you.”

It was true nonetheless.

“Never fear, Papa. I shall behave today. I give my word.”

The irascible Duke of Waycross would find no fault with her comportment this day. For her father’s sake, Sophronie fully intended to be the quintessence of serene decorum in the duke’s presence. She would staunchly refuse to be drawn into a verbal sparring match. Even if it meant she had to bite her tongue. Literally.

She angled toward the exit and froze, a groan lodging in her throat.

Fiddlesticks.

No, not fiddlesticks. That was far, far too tame an expletive.

Bloody, bloody hell.

Papa hadn’t been warning her to behave today but rather cautioning her to hold her tongue now.

In all of his imposing ruggedness, Evan Gordonstone, Duke of Waycross, had opened the coach door. But of course he had. The man had the most exasperating habit of appearing wherever Sophronie least wanted him to be.

She summoned a smile so disingenuous, her facial muscles twitched in betrayal.

Perchance he hadn’t heard her unflattering outburst.

His features granite hard and just as inflexible, Waycross raised an imperial, slashing black eyebrow.

“Sorry to disappoint ye, but there havena been bears in Scotland since the fifth century or thereabouts, Miss Slater.”