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touch upset you turned down her offer of a trip to Paris to secure new fashions.”
    Now they were beginning to get somewhere.
    â€œIs that why she sent you, to convince me to take a trip across the ocean to visit the House of Worth?”
    Agatha took another sip of tea, swallowed, and shook her head. “No, especially after I told her I balked at the same idea, even though my mother believes I would look divine in gowns created by Charles Worth. Lucky for me, my position at the New-York Tribune gives me a ready excuse to avoid taking a leisurely jaunt across the sea.”
    â€œPerhaps I should look into securing a career. Maybe then my mother would cease her relentless worrying and discontinue sending my friends to check up on me.” She caught Agatha’s eye. “I’m fine, by the way, even though I’m sure Mother told you differently.”
    â€œThat remains to be seen.” Agatha set her teacup aside. “But returning to the idea of a career, how is your writing?”
    â€œMediocre at best.”
    â€œThen I’m afraid you probably wouldn’t make it as a journalist.” She tapped her finger on her chin. “Are you any good at snooping?”
    â€œSnooping?”
    â€œYou know, ferreting out information. Arabella Wilder has taken to helping Theodore with his private investigation business, and I’m sure they’d be more than happy to bring you on if you’re any good at that sort of thing.”
    â€œI used to be proficient at running down my brothers when they tried to avoid me, but that was years ago.” Felicia wrinkledher nose. “Besides, Arabella and Theodore, even though they’ve been married for a few months now, still seem overly enthralled with each other. While that’s a lovely state for them to be in . . . considering I’ve recently suffered a direct blow to the heart, I hardly think it would be wise for me to be in constant contact with a couple so in love.”
    â€œAha, so you really aren’t fine.”
    It truly was unfortunate Agatha was such an intelligent sort, but since Felicia had no intention of discussing her recent heartache, especially since she was in a lovely frame of mind at the moment, she settled for waving Agatha’s comment away with one deliberate flick of her wrist. “Yes, well, getting back to a career choice for me, I’m afraid I have no real skills, and isn’t that a sad state of affairs for a lady of twenty-four to recognize?”
    â€œYou’re very good at helping the needy. Perhaps you should continue on with that.”
    It wasn’t as if she hadn’t thought about continuing on with her charitable efforts, even though she knew full well it was hardly likely she’d ever help out as much in Reverend Fraser’s church. That would be somewhat awkward, especially since it appeared far too many people had discovered her feelings about the gentleman. It would only be a matter of time until he found out about them, or worse yet, his wife.
    The new Mrs. Fraser was truly a compassionate soul, but her compassion might not extend quite so far as to embrace a lady who’d longed to be with her husband.
    The pesky little problem of what to do with her life now that reality had smacked her in the face had plagued her endlessly throughout the night. She’d taken to having a rather long chat with God, not that He’d sent her any clear solution to her problems as of yet, but in the midst of that chat, she’d come to a few uncomfortable truths.
    She’d changed her identity in order to secure the affections of a gentleman.
    She’d thrown herself into charitable endeavors to please that gentleman, and . . . although she’d gone to more church services than she could count, she’d barely listened to any of the sermons.
    She’d been completely ridiculous.
    She needed to make amends, and in order to do that, she needed to