Read Online I So Don't Do Makeup by Barrie Summy - Free Book Online

ghosts will be spying on your behavior.”
    â€œBasically.” At the American Potato Company counter, I ask for a large fries.
    â€œAre you going to follow Mrs. Howard’s orders? And drop the case?”
    â€œNo way. I can’t do that to Lacey. I can’t do that to us.”
    â€œYou know you can count on me.” We bump knuckles.
    â€œHere’s what I’m thinking,” I say. “If the PSS is ignoring what’s going on with Naked Makeup—”
    â€œIt must be a simple mystery.” Junie sprinkles salt on our fries. “Which means—”
    â€œWe can solve it,” I say, loving this BFF-finish-the-sentence thing. “Easy—”
    â€œSchmeasy. And Mrs. Howard will be begging youto take five minutes of Real Time with your mom as a reward.”
    â€œAnd I’ll be even more famous on the WWWD, and the foreign Academy—”
    Junie shoves the cardboard boat of fries at me and sticks her fingers in her ears. “Do not tell me any secrets. Seriously. I do not want to know what I’m not supposed to know.”
    I chew furiously on a fry. When I get excited, my mouth takes on a life of its own, flapping and spewing away. And now I can’t remember exactly what was secret and what wasn’t. What I’m allowed to share and what I’m not allowed to share. Which means I have to keep all of it to myself. Wah!
    Junie unplugs her ears. “Is it safe?”
    â€œYeah. I’m under control.” I squirt ketchup in the corner of the boat. “Something Mrs. Howard never brought up? My grandfather.”
    My grandfather’s fiercely loyal and has a great sense of direction. He’ll be a good help with this mystery.
    Junie grabs a fry. “So, it’s you, me and your grandfather.” She dunks the fry in the puddle of ketchup. “Plus, Nick and Josh can help us.”
    â€œLet’s get going!”
    Junie pops the fry in her mouth. We both push our hair behind our ears so that our cute matching best-friend earrings dangle and swing. Then, legs in sync, we stride off for some important mall recon.
    â€œThe plan is to check out the entire mall and see what other stores and kiosks sell makeup, right?” Junie’s got a determined look on her bleached freckled face. The same look she gets when a teacher’s passing out a big test.
    We wander past every store on every level.
    At the entrance to the department store, we stop. We can see the makeup counter where Amber used to work till she quit for Naked Makeup. Amber’s ex-boss, Crystal, is packing nail polish into a box.
    â€œWhat do you think?” I say. “I mean, Lacey and Crystal are competitors, but they’re such good friends. Amber says the three of them eat lunch together and share beauty tips.”
    â€œRight after she switched jobs, I asked Amber how weird it was to still be at the same mall. She told me to grow up, that I just don’t get the makeup world.” Junie shifts her fake leather purse on her shoulder. “Maybe if we were a couple of years older and had part-time jobs in the cosmetics industry, it wouldn’t seem weird. Maybe we’re just too thirteen.”
    And that, in a nutshell, is why I love having Junie on my team. She’s beyond smart.
    At the Beauty Connection, we pop in to check out the merchandise.
    Junie opens and sniffs a bottle of foaming bath oil. “There’s some overlap between the stuff in here andNaked Makeup’s inventory, but Lacey’s products are much higher-end.”
    â€œNot to mention no one works here for more than a week.” Which is handy for Junie and me. We come in to use their free samples almost every weekend, and no one recognizes us or asks us if we’re ever planning to buy.
    I hold up a black-with-white-polka-dots cosmetics bag that would fit perfectly in the front pouch of my backpack. “Cute?”
    â€œGo for it,” Junie says.
    Mall