by Hope McLean
“Oh, really?” Derrica asked. She pulled out her phone. “I’ve got a photo of myself in this gown. See?” She pushed her phone in front of Rhianna’s face.
Rhianna squinted her eyes as she peered at the phone. “That looks nothing like my dress!” she announced loudly as she began to back away from Derrica.
Derrica’s eyes narrowed. “I should have known better than to believe that phony apology you gave me at lunch the other day. You’re not happy unless you’re making trouble!”
Rhianna looked angry. “Keep it up, Derrica. And I’ll make sure you’re kept off the guest list at every party in this town.”
“Ha!” Derrica shouted. “As if you could. I know for a fact you weren’t invited here tonight. How did you get in? Did you use a fake name or something?”
As Rhianna and Derrica battled it out, Jasmine came running into the hotel. She stopped short when she heard the reality stars’ shouts echoing throughout the lobby. She noticed the two young women working the front desk were intently watching the fight unfold as they whispered to each other.
“That’s Derrica from East Coast Class,” one said to the other. “I wish I could hear what they were saying!”
Jasmine had an idea. She walked up to the clerks.
“If you want, I’ll keep an eye on the desk for you while you get closer to the action,” Jasmine suggested. “If anyone comes, I’ll run and get you right away.”
The women exchanged glances. “We really shouldn’t, but I don’t want to miss this,” one woman said. “Thanks!” They both hurried off to get a closer look as Jasmine moved behind the desk and began typing on the hotel computer.
Meanwhile, Erin and Willow were still trying to figure out how to get Derrica’s room number.
“We can ask at the front desk,” Erin suggested. “But they wouldn’t give out that kind of info to us.”
“We’ve got to try!” Willow said. “Let’s hurry.”
They raced over to the front desk. “Excuse me,” Erin panted. “We need your help. It’s really important!”
Jasmine peered out from behind the computer. “I always help my friends,” she said with a smile.
“Jasmine?” Willow asked, shocked. “Look, I’m really sorry —”
“No time!” Jasmine said. “We’ll talk later. Right now you need the room number, right?”
Erin and Willow nodded.
“It’s room six twenty-five. Now hurry!” Jasmine said.
Willow raced toward the staircase, Erin right behind her. “Wait!” Erin yelled. “The elevator will probably be faster.”
Willow was a quick runner, but six flights was a lot. Together they ran over to the elevator and Willow hit the up button. The doors opened and they hurried inside. The elevator ride seemed to take forever. Willow tapped her foot impatiently the entire time but finally the doors slid open on the sixth floor. They rushed into the hallway and followed the signs to room 625.
“Of course it had to be the room farthest away,” Erin complained as they ran past room 600 first. The hotel room numbers flew by them as they pounded down the hall until they reached the end, where they had to turn right for room 625. They rounded the corner just in time to see Isabel and Aaron coming out of Derrica’s suite. They skidded to a halt and stopped right in front of them.
“Nice outfits,” Erin said bitingly. “Where did you get them, the costume store?”
Aaron laughed. He was gripping something in his hand tightly. Willow saw a gold chain peeking out from between his fingers. It was the necklace!
They stood for a minute, staring at each other.
No one was sure what to do next, until Isabel broke the tension.
“You’ll never win!” she cried. Then she and Aaron took off running.
Willow and Erin raced after them. The chase was on!
Back at the coat check, Lili anxiously scanned the hallway for any sign of Willow and Erin.
What if the Rivals get the necklace? she thought. The Rivals already have the ruby and the diamond, and maybe even the sapphire. If they get the emerald tonight, it’s all over.
Lili took a deep breath and decided to distract herself with glamour. She peered into the ballroom. It was filled with party guests in stunning dresses and crisp tuxedoes. Ninjalike servers slipped between the crowd, carrying silver trays of food that looked like tiny pieces of art. In the background, a jazz band played smooth music.
Willow’s mom is so lucky to be there, Lili mused dreamily. And I think she looks perfect. Some of these people are just too overdressed.
“Earth to Lili!” Jasmine said, waving her palm in front of Lili’s face.
Lili jumped. “Jasmine!” she cried as she ran over to give her friend a big hug.
“I thought you guys might need my help, so I came by,” Jasmine said. She filled Lili in on the room number, then Lili told her about Isabel and Aaron.
“I’m sure they’ve got it under control,” Lili said. “But thank heavens you showed up!”
Then a tone rang from Lili’s cell phone.
“Oh, wait,” Lili said, flipping it open. “Willow’s texting me now.”
* * *
Willow and Erin followed Aaron and Isabel as they raced through the twisting hallways, turning right, then left, then right again. Willow, the fastest runner, had quickly sprinted ahead of Erin and then Isabel. Aaron was just a few feet away.
“Tackle him before he gets to the stairs!” Erin yelled.
Heart pounding, Willow pushed forward like she was in a race and Aaron was at the finish line. She reached out to grab him when suddenly she felt her legs give way beneath her.
Slam! She fell facedown onto the carpeted floor. Then she heard a laugh and the thud of a heavy door closing.
Erin ran up and knelt down beside her.
“What happened?” Willow asked, dazed.
“Isabel tripped you,” Erin said grimly. “You okay?”
“Sure,” Willow said, but she winced as she got to her feet. “Scratch that. My ankle’s twisted. Erin, get them!”
“Me?” Erin asked. Willow was always the one who did the superhero athletic stuff.
“I’ll text Lili and tell her to watch the front,” Willow said. “Now, go!”
Erin turned and raced to the staircase. The sound of Aaron and Isabel’s footsteps echoed from a few floors below. Looking down, Erin could see the top of Isabel’s blond head. Then she heard the sound of a door opening.
By the time Erin reached the door, Aaron and Isabel had gone through it. She pushed it open and looked in both directions. Had she lost them?
Then she noticed that a swinging door down on the right was still moving back and forth.
They must have gone through there, Erin realized. She sped to the door and pushed inside.
The sound of steam hissing, clanging pots and pans, and shouting voices assaulted her and she entered the busy hotel kitchen. Men and women in white chef’s jackets and hats busily worked at stations along rows of gleaming stainless-steel tables and ovens. They were so busy that they didn’t notice Aaron quietly weaving his way between them, heading for the next exit.
“Stop that boy! He’s a thief!” Erin yelled, but her voice couldn’t be heard over the din. She sprinted across the floor, darting from left to right around the chefs like a soccer player dribbling down a field.
Wait a second. Where’s Isabel? she thought.
Splat! Something cold and mushy hit her in the face, and Erin stopped, stunned. When she got her bearings she wiped some of the mess off and got a good look at it.
“Cake?” she asked, wiping the frosting from her eyes.
That’s when she saw Isabel standing in front of her, grinning.
“Face it, Erin,” Isabel said in her French accent. “You will always lose.”
As she spoke, a tall, red-faced chef marched up behind her. Erin grinned.
“Maybe not,” Erin said. Then she quickly darted to the next row of workstations as the angry chef grabbed Isab
el by the arm.
“What are you doing in my kitchen?” he bellowed.
Erin would have loved to stay to see the look on Isabel’s face, but she knew she had to get to Aaron.
“Excuse me. Pardon me. Excuse me,” she said politely, making her way through the chefs. They didn’t even bat an eye at the girl with cake on her face.
Erin finally pushed through the kitchen doors just in time to see Aaron making a right turn down the hallway. She ran as fast as she could, adrenaline fueling her speed.
Now Aaron was making his way past the coat check, and to Erin’s relief she saw Jasmine and Lili standing at the end of the hallway, blocking his way to the door. Then the elevator dinged and opened, and Willow limped out.
Aaron stopped in the middle of the hallway, weighing his options. He looked scared and confused.
“Woo-hoo! We got him!” Erin cheered.
“You have nothing,” a deep voice boomed.
Arthur Atkinson stepped out of the ballroom, followed by Ryan. He calmly approached Aaron and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Aaron, Ryan, and I are going to walk out of here, and there is nothing you can do about it,” he said smoothly.
“We can yell! We can call the police!” Willow said, her dark eyes flashing angrily.
“Go ahead. See who believes you,” Arthur said. Then he swiftly ushered Aaron and Ryan out the door and into a waiting limousine.
Erin raced up to meet her friends.
“It’s not fair!” she wailed. “We should have … we could have …”
“Arthur’s right,” Jasmine said sadly. “We’ve accused the Rivals of stealing a jewel before, and we only got humiliated for it.”
Willow limped back into the coat check and sunk to the ground, defeated. She put her head in her hands.
Erin curled her hand into a fist and shook it into the air.
“You wanna know how the Atkinson family got so rich?” she asked angrily. “They probably made their fortune by other people paying them to stay away. They are the most infuriating, obnoxious family on the planet!”
Lili shuddered. “What if the Rivals have the sapphire, too?”
The girls all took a moment to think about that.
“Then it’s all over,” Willow said, her voice muffled from her hands still covering her face.
“We did our best.” Lili tried to cheer the group up. “And we came really close to stopping them, too.” But even the normally optimistic Lili looked glum.
“But we didn’t,” Willow said as she pulled her hands away from her face. “The Rivals are playing a serious game. And now more than ever, I think it’s a game we just can’t win.”
Two days later, the girls sat in the school’s cafeteria together. They were still feeling terrible.
Erin picked at the food on her tray.
“Hey, it’s meatballs, one of your favorites,” Lili pointed out.
“I have no appetite,” Erin said as she pushed a meatball aimlessly around her plate.
“I have some cool news.” Lili tried to change the subject. “Willow’s mom made best-dressed in the paper for the outfit I styled for her!”
“She was totally floored,” Willow said. “She is going to recommend you to all of her friends, Lili.”
“And that’s not the only good thing. I see another silver lining,” Lili said with a smile. “And she’s sitting right there.” She pointed to Jasmine.
Willow smiled in agreement. “Last week when we weren’t talking was the worst, Jasmine. Way worse than what happened Saturday night. We’ve been best friends since kindergarten. I can’t imagine not having you around.”
“I’m sorry I was so stubborn,” Jasmine replied. “I should have talked to you before the charity ball, but it was too hard for me.”
“I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have been so bossy. I totally trust you,” Willow explained. “But when I get nervous, I feel like I have to do everything myself or things will go wrong. I promise from now on I’ll try to work on that.”
“Thanks, Willow.” Jasmine grinned. “I appreciate that. We were all under so much pressure, it’s no wonder we had a meltdown. And I promise the next time I start to feel upset, I’ll talk to you about it instead of blowing up.”
Lili beamed. “I’m so happy we’re a team again. Win or lose, we stick together!”
The girls huddled together and put their hands in the center for a cheer.
“Goooo, Jewels!”
Ms. Ortiz walked up to their table.
“Hello, girls!” she said. “Principal Frederickson would like to see you in her office.”
The girls looked at each other. Had the principal already found out about the emerald?
They got an even bigger surprise when they walked into her office — and saw Derrica Girard sitting there!
“Please sit down, girls,” Principal Frederickson said.
The four Jewels obeyed, stunned.
“Don’t look so scared, girls,” Derrica said with a smile. “You’re not in trouble or anything.”
Jasmine let out a huge sigh of relief and sank back into her chair.
“That’s good,” she said.
“But what are you doing here?” Willow asked. “We never told you we went to this school.”
“It’s all very interesting,” Principal Frederickson explained. “You see, I had been trying to reach Derrica to talk to her about the emerald.”
“And then yesterday, when I realized it was stolen, my publicist finally told me that your principal had called,” Derrica went on. “She hadn’t taken it seriously until that point. Then when Alicia and I talked, and she told me she was a school principal, I remembered that two schoolgirls had tried to warn me about the emerald being stolen. I mentioned it to her and, well, here we are.”
“Alicia?” Lili muttered with a curious look. It was difficult to imagine the stern principal having a first name, for some reason.
Willow looked at Principal Frederickson. “Does she know about the Martha Washington jewels?”
The principal nodded. “I told her. I think she deserves to know.”
“It’s really amazing,” Derrica said, with a wave of her blond hair. “That emerald has been in my family for years. I always knew it was special, but I never knew that it was an important part of history.”
“But now Arthur Atkinson has it,” Erin pointed out. “So you can tell the police and get it back from him, right?”
“Wait a moment,” Principal Frederickson interrupted. “How do you know for sure that Arthur is responsible for stealing the emerald on Saturday?”
The girls looked at each other. There was no point in keeping the secret now.
“We were working coat check at the ball that night,” Erin said. “We saw Aaron and Isabel head up to Derrica’s room. Aaron got the necklace. We almost stopped him, but then Arthur Atkinson stepped in and they all escaped.”
Principal Frederickson looked like she was about to scold them, but Derrica spoke up first.
“I know Arthur,” she said with a frown. “We used to travel in the same circles. He is a conniving, ruthless man. I’m not sure if going to the police would do any good. After all, you girls are the only witnesses, and …”
Erin sighed. “I know. We’re just a bunch of kids. Nobody takes us seriously.”
“So you’re just going to let him have it?” Jasmine asked in disbelief.
Now it was Derrica’s turn to sigh. “I don’t know. Maybe he’ll give it back after he’s done doing … whatever it is he’s doing with those stones.”
“The Martha Washington diary says that the four stones hold a secret,” Erin said. “We know he has the ruby, the diamond, and now the emerald. If he has the sapphire, too, there is no use trying to stop him now. He’ll have everything he needs.”
The four girls looked miserable as Erin’s words sank in. It was all over!
But Derrica shook her head. “That’s the thing. I don’t think he does have the sapphire,”
she said.
Willow’s eyes widened. “But how do you know for sure?”
“Well, Elan was telling me that Arthur’s going around to all of the jewelers and clothiers asking about a certain type of sapphire,” Derrica explained. “I remember he was always angry about the Atkinson sapphire being stolen all those years ago. I assumed that he’s still looking for it, but now that I know about the Martha Washington jewels, his search suddenly means something very different.”
“He probably is,” Willow said, looking excited again for the first time since the emerald was stolen. “And if he doesn’t have the sapphire yet, then he doesn’t have the four clues that he needs.”
Jasmine almost jumped out of her chair. “Derrica, I just thought of something. The diamond had a clue etched on the back of it. Did you ever see anything on the back of the emerald?”
“No,” Derrica said. “It was always in its setting. I never looked at the back of it.”
Everyone was silent for a moment.
“Of course,” Principal Frederickson said slowly, “you girls will stay out of this in the future, as you’ve promised, correct?”
“Gee, they seem like pretty good detectives to me,” Derrica said, grinning at the girls. “Did you really chase those necklace thieves through the hotel?”
“Erin and Willow did most of the chasing,” Lili said. “Erin got a faceful of cake, and Willow twisted her ankle.”
“It’s pretty much better, really,” Willow said in response to Principal Frederickson’s horrified look.
“This is exactly why I wanted you girls to stay out of this,” the principal said fretfully.
“We can’t stop now,” Erin pleaded. “We’ve come this far.”
“Well, I, for one, am going to start looking for that sapphire,” Derrica said. “If Arthur Atkinson thinks he can steal my emerald from me, he’s got another thing coming. I will beat him at his own game. If I find the sapphire, maybe we can trade it for the emerald. I’m not losing my lucky necklace to that man. And I wouldn’t mind getting some help from some whip-smart sixth-grade girls. You have proven yourselves to be super detectives. I’m impressed!”
Erin quickly took out her phone. “I’ll send you my number through your Chatter page. If we find out anything, we’ll let you know.”