AFTER A DAY OF searching, and with help from Taylor, the police found the Crystal Cove Crystal half-buried in one of the deepest sea caves, about a quarter mile behind where we’d found Noelle. While that cave appeared to be above sea level, a not-uncommon mix of high tides and a storm surge could’ve easily crept up one night and washed it out into the deep ocean. And none of us would have ever known.

It really made me wonder about other things the ocean has taken from those caves over the years. And what it’s left behind.

I was deep in thought the next day at school, and Velma was noticeably worried about me. She kept casting nervous glances at me every time we passed each other in the halls.

Finally, when we sat down to lunch, I snapped at her. “Stop looking at me so much! You’re creeping me out!”

“I’m just trying to gauge where you’re at today,” she said nervously. She pushed her hair behind her ears and leaned in. “This isn’t like you, Daph. Even your other friends are concerned.”

Velma surreptitiously pointed at a nearby table, where Haley Moriguchi and Shawna Foster and Aimee Drake were sitting. I glanced at them and, sure enough, they were staring at me. Quickly they looked away and all pretended to be super interested in their lunches. Which, having purchased one myself—a bland salad with barely edible grilled chicken and two lonely slices of cucumber—was highly unlikely.

I sighed. “I’ll deal with them later. They can’t handle moody Daphne.”

Velma made a sympathetic face. “Funny, because moody Daphne is the only Daphne I can handle.”

I smiled despite myself. Velma took the opportunity to try to lift my spirits.

“Listen, some good things happened this week! It wasn’t a total bust. We solved the mystery of the gems!”

“But not the mystery we set out to solve,” I muttered as Shaggy jogged past us, a sandwich in each hand. He never even looked our way. Watching him disappear through the lunch crowd, I wondered whether he really meant what he’d said, about being poison.

Because the thing was, I felt a little like that, too. Like maybe the real stuff inside me, the true Daphne, was so toxic, so opposite of what people wanted me to be, that I could never reveal it to anyone. Look what had happened when I’d tried.

I tore my eyes away from Shaggy and noticed Velma hesitating. “What?” I asked her. “Spill it.”

“I do have a question for you,” she admitted. Her eyebrows twisted into a straight line. “You trust me, right?”

Surprised, I nodded. “Of course.”

She looked at her hands. “It’s just … there were a few times this week where it seemed like you didn’t. Like you were more interested in what … someone else had to say about things.”

“You mean Ram,” I realized, bristling.

She nodded, shrugged. “It just felt like … I don’t know. We’re supposed to be partners. And sometimes it didn’t feel like we were.”

I stared at the table. There was a tightness in my chest, like I was zipping in my feelings again. “Don’t worry,” I assured her. “That won’t happen again.”

I didn’t tell her about the surprise I had planned for her, but I hoped it would show her how sorry I was.

I DRAGGED MYSELF HOME, my backpack heavy on my shoulders, kicking at the leaves cluttering the sidewalks. It was Friday afternoon and, for the first time in a week, it felt like, finally, no one in Crystal Cove was talking about ghosts. Even the Howler had moved on; the day’s headlines were all about some controversy brewing over a local business ordinance that was coming up for a vote.

Taylor hadn’t been back to school, but I tracked down Shaggy and he said he’d spoken to her and said she seemed as okay as she could be. It turned out her mom had talked her into helping with some of the ghost sightings that had happened around town, including the stunt Daphne had witnessed in the Haunted Village. But Shaggy said she didn’t really understand what her mom had been up to—she’d thought it was all an elaborate prank—and I believed her.

Noelle had tapped into the town’s fears so easily. She understood the power of suggestion, just like Frank had said. Half the incidents people had reported were innocuous, but their importance had become inflated in their own minds, and why? Because of fear. Daphne and I had felt it, even in our own homes.

The power of suggestion was strong … so strong that Noelle had used it on the spur of the moment with the Lady Vampire of the Bay. She’d heard that Mr. Rogers had mentioned the Lady Vampire at the beach when the jewels had been discovered. All she’d had to do to our overactive imaginations was walk the shoreline in a red wig and a long, flowing cloak. And Taylor had been her unwitting accomplice.

All that was over now, but I still felt bad for Taylor. All she’d wanted was to find a place where she belonged. She’d believed it was here, but after everything her mom had put the town through, it wouldn’t be easy. Daphne and I had plans to reach out to her when the dust had settled a bit more.

So, all told, I was grateful for the calm and quiet that had returned to my life. But it didn’t last long.

“Boo!”

I jumped when a figure popped out of the bushes in front of me. Fred Jones laughed when he saw the look on my face.

“Zoinks, Fred,” I complained, gripping at my chest. But who can say, really, whether my heart was racing from the scare, or from his presence?

He was still laughing. I rolled my eyes and stepped around him. I just wanted to go home.

“No, wait!” he called after me.

“What is it, Fred?” I heard the impatience in my voice, even though I was trying to keep it cool, even.

He shrugged and fell into step next to me, his shoulder bumping into mine. “Just saying hey.”

I shot him a sideways look. It was a mistake, that look, because he was especially striking from that angle.

A stalk of bravery shot up inside me. Now or never, I realized. “I owe you a thanks,” I said. “For calling the police the other day.”

“No problem,” Fred said easily. Then again, Fred said everything easily. His whole life was easiness, simplicity, lighthearted fun.

“Well, you really helped me out with that,” I added. Then I paused before bringing up what I really wanted to tell him. “We’re even now, okay? You don’t have to keep following me around.” I stared straight ahead, concentrating on moving my feet forward.

“Huh?”

“I know Shaggy asked you to keep me occupied so I would stop tracking him.” I paused for emphasis, facing him on the sidewalk. “But the case is closed. I’m not following Shaggy anymore, so you don’t have to follow me.”

Fred’s wide face was blank. He stared at me, not moving a muscle.

“Don’t you get it, Fred?” I tried again, simpler this time. “You’re released from whatever promise you gave to Shaggy. You don’t have to keep me occupied anymore. I’ll leave Shaggy alone.”

Fred whistled lowly, smoothed a strand of his blond hair back from his forehead. “Dinkley, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

I shifted impatiently. “At Shaggy’s party. When he asked you to keep an eye on me so I wouldn’t bother him. I know all about it, it’s fine.”

But Fred shook his head. “Shaggy never asked me that.”

I stared at him, frozen. I’d overheard Aimee Drake and Aparna Din saying that, hadn’t I?

And I’d believed them. Because of course Fred Jones wouldn’t have asked me to dance if he hadn’t been instructed to by one of his oldest friends. I mean … right?

Our staring contest lengthened until, finally, Fred shrugged again. His whole face changed when he smiled—his blue eyes crinkled; his sharp jaw softened and rounded.

“Anyway,” he said. “Have a good weekend.”

And then he waved, darted into the street, and broke into a jog, disappearing across someone’s bright green lawn.

I was so lost in thought the rest of the way home that, somehow, I ended up at our new-old house rather than the apartment. Well, it was my favorite place to think, anyway, so I crossed the lawn, unlocked the back door, and stepped inside. I could think of no better way to spend the end of a long week than hanging out, alone, in the house that was helping put my family back together again.

But when I stepped inside, I nearly fell over.

My hands shook as I grabbed my phone and dialed. When Daphne answered, I could barely choke out the words. “We have a new mystery! Someone’s broken into our new house and … and … well … cleaned it!”

The house was spotless—cleared of the leaves and other debris the wind had dragged in, free of the dust and grime we hadn’t gotten around to cleaning yet. It shone.

But Daphne just laughed. “Consider it a housewarming present.”

“What? You did this?” I sputtered.

“No!” Daphne sounded horrified. “But I hired an agency. My stepdad still feels bad about how long it took to get the house back in your dad’s name. This was actually his idea! And I feel bad about … well, I just wanted to do something special for you. Your family’s been through a lot.”

Wow. “So has yours,” I reminded her, hearing a crack in my voice. Quickly I cleared my throat. “Thanks.”

When we hung up, I had something in my eyes. (Okay, fine. It was tears. I had tears in my eyes.) I rubbed and then winced—I kept forgetting how to operate these stupid contacts.

I popped into the bathroom, marveling at the pure white porcelain sink (it had previously been a dull off-white), and stared in the mirror.

I saw me, but incomplete. I blinked and rubbed my eyes again.

I’d been carrying my old glasses around in my backpack all week, just in case I’d had a problem with my new contacts. Well, here was the problem, I finally realized: I didn’t like them. I didn’t want to get used to them. My little experiment was over.

Squinting, I popped out the little lenses and grabbed my glasses. They slipped on like a glove. Satisfied, I pushed them up the bridge of my nose and grinned at my reflection.

“Ah,” I said, nodding. Fred’s face flashed before me and I paused, wondering what he was going to say when he saw me at school on Monday.

Then I realized: It didn’t matter. I didn’t care. I was Velma Dinkley, and I wore glasses and solved mysteries and loved my cat and had one of the greatest best friends the world had ever known.

And I was perfectly happy, for maybe the first time I could ever remember, to be me.

I COULDN’T BELIEVE MY eyes when the name flashed up on my screen. I rubbed them, brushing away the dream I’d been in the middle of, and checked again.

What was Shaggy doing calling me at seven in the morning? Actually, scratch that: What was Shaggy doing calling me at all?

“Hello?” I mumbled, trying to find my voice in the morning fog.

“Daph?”

He sounded far away.

He sounded scared.

I sat up in bed and flung off my blankets. “Shaggy? What’s up?”

“It’s happened.”

Something in his voice … it made me ice cold. I burrowed back under my blankets. “What happened? What do you mean?”

When he didn’t answer, I said, “You’re scaring me, Shaggy.”

“It’s, like, all over,” he finally said. “Check the papers.”

He hung up.

I threw myself out of bed and ran to my desk, opening up my laptop. I checked a bunch of news sites—the Howler but also the national networks.

Shaggy was right. It was everywhere.

Rogers Enterprises in Financial Ruin; CEO Samuel Rogers Faces Charges of Fraud, Embezzlement, Extortion.

I went down the rabbit hole, parsing through story after story, until I found what I somehow knew I would find. What I’d been looking for since the moment I’d heard Shaggy’s voice.

The first story to report on Rogers Enterprises, the breaking news that was referenced and quoted in every other article in mainstream media, came from a familiar name. A young reporter, just starting out.

Ramsay Hansen.