Bead-Dazzled by Olivia Bennett Page A

like the only solution. There was no way she was letting Jackson—or Ivana—see her like this.
    “Under the cover of darkness?”
    “They’ll think no one is home. They’ll go away.”
    “This is silly.” Charlie shook free of her grip.
    “Do you have a better plan? Look at me!” Her whispered voice grew high and thin. She heard muffled voices coming from the hall.
    Charlie slumped onto a chair. “Good point.” The doorbell rang four times in a row. “Persistent, aren’t they?”
    “They’ll give up,” Emma assured him. She was positive Ivana and Lexie would be only too happy to leave her behind.
    She waited in the silence, straining her ears to catch their voices again.
    Then she heard an unmistakable giggle. A giggle she’d been listening to since she was four. Holly was back!
    A key jiggled in the lock. The front door squeaked open.
    “I don’t know why she didn’t answer. I just went to the store to—hey, that’s weird. Why’s it so dark?” Holly’s surprised voice rang out through the apartment.
    Emma glanced frantically about the kitchen. Would hiding under the table do anything?
    “Emma? Where are you?”
    “It smells weird in here.” Emma didn’t need to be in the hall to picture the disgusted face Ivana was making.
    “Anyone home?” Jackson called.
    Charlie raised his hands. Emma shook her head. She wished she’d thought to write a note and leave it in the hall.
    “Emma? Are you okay?” Holly’s tone changed. Emma heard the panic and instantly felt bad. She was hiding from her best friend and the boy she liked—and scaring them.
    “In here!” she called out. She’d just have to face them.
    Holly stepped through the doorway first, with Jackson, Clayton, Ivana, and Lexie right behind. She reached for the switch, flooding the small kitchen with light.
    Lexie gasped. Ivana let out a self-satisfied shriek.
    “Em, you’re wet!” Holly cried out.
    “And yellow,” Clayton added.
    She knew all of that. She readied herself to explain what happened, but then she heard Jackson.

    Laughing.
    At her.

 
CHAPTER 8
    LIVING DANGEROUSLY
    I t’s over, she realized, staring down at her yellow-stained hands. Not that it’d ever really started. He was laughing at her.
    Good-bye to the Jackson-Emma couple concept.
    It took less than a minute, but she pulled a recovery and burst out laughing, too. Grandma Grace had taught her this back in elementary school. She’d always preach, “If you can’t make it better, laugh at it.” Grandma Grace was a big believer in being able to laugh at yourself. And Emma had to admit this was funny. If she couldn’t laugh at herself now, then when?
    She stopped laughing when Ivana pulled out her cell phone and began snapping photos. “Whoa!” she cried, raising her arms in protest. It wasn’t post-all-over-the-web funny.
    “Back down.” Charlie stepped in front of Ivana.
    “But she looks so precious!” Ivana smirked, turning up the collar of the fitted leather jacket she wore over skinny black pants.

    “And yellow!” cried Lexie.
    “There’s more yellow dye where that came from,” Charlie warned. “You’ll be looking like SpongeBob’s twin sister if you don’t delete those photos.”
    Ivana narrowed her eyes. “You wouldn’t.”
    Charlie shrugged. “If you want to live dangerously….”
    Emma was impressed. Charlie had never stood up for her like that before.
    “What’s going on?” Jackson’s gaze darted between Emma’s dripping yellow-ness and Charlie all up in Ivana’s face.
    “I had a little fabric dying accident.” Emma smiled. “Crazy, right?”
    “How do you figure in?” Jackson nodded toward Charlie.
    “Trying to supervise, man. Not easy. Home pigmentation is a perilous business.” Charlie stepped away from Ivana, who’d tucked her phone into her blue suede wristlet.
    “I don’t get it.” Clayton ran his palm over his buzzed hair. “Why do you reek like curried chicken?”
    “I used a spice to color the dye—”