Read Online Cold as Ice by Carolyn Keene - Free Book Online Page A

neglected?” Nancy asked him. “This case is eating up a lot of time that we could be spending together.”
    â€œYou’re doing a big favor for a friend of mine and for my college,” Ned pointed out. “Besides, we have this evening to have fun.”
    He bent his head down and kissed Nancy so sweetly that she couldn’t catch her breath. When the kiss finally ended, she rested her cheek against his chest, and Ned began to stroke her hair. They might have stayed like that until both of them had frostbite, but Jerry came over and tapped Ned on the shoulder.
    â€œCome on, Nickerson,” he said. “The Fleur-de-Lis is going to be packed tonight. They won’t hold our table forever.”
    Ned and Jerry headed for their frat house, while the girls took the path to the dorm. They were halfway there when Nancy suddenly stopped.
    â€œBess, George, you go ahead. There’ssomething I want to check out.” She took the room key from her pocket and handed it to George.
    George opened her mouth to argue, but Bess took her arm and walked her away. “You know it won’t do any good to try to talk her out of it. Please make it fast, Nan,” Bess called over her shoulder. “We don’t want to be late for dinner.”
    Nancy made her way to the path that led through the woods where she’d found Rob’s jacket. As she walked, she mentally checked over her assumptions. Whoever was trying to frame Rob—whether or not it was the thief—would not have walked around with a gasoline-soaked jacket. So the jacket, and maybe the gas as well, must have been hidden for part of the afternoon, probably somewhere near the little woods where the jacket was later placed. If she could find that hiding place, she might find a clue to the identity of the framer.
    She stopped in her tracks. What about the police search? They had been looking for stolen jewels, true, but wouldn’t they have seen the jacket and a gasoline container?
    But then, what if the police had seen them but hadn’t noticed them? What if the jacket and the gas container had been someplace where they looked as if they belonged?
    Nancy continued down the narrow road, scanning both sides in the waning, late-afternoonlight. She was just up the road from the edge of the woods when she saw it. Just off the narrow lane, behind a screen of bushes, was a small wooden shed with double doors.
    Nancy found her penlight in her pocket and shone it on the building. Over the doors was a small sign that read Emerson College B & G— Keep Out. Nancy nodded. “B & G” was probably an abbreviation for Buildings and Grounds, the college maintenance department. And who would be surprised to find gasoline, or even an old jacket, in a maintenance shed?
    She shifted the light, then frowned. The double doors were padlocked. That meant that whoever had hidden, then retrieved, Rob’s jacket from the shed had to have known the combination.
    Suddenly Nancy stopped. She raised her head, standing very still, listening carefully. Had that been the sound of someone stepping on snow? She heard nothing now but the wind through the branches of some trees. Nancy looked around, but it was too dark to see anything except the outline of nearby bushes.
    She stepped forward to get a closer look at the doors. The padlock was firmly fastened, but when she tugged at it, the hasp came off the door. The wood was too rotten to hold the screws.
    The door creaked as Nancy pushed it open and shone her penlight inside. The shelves that linedthe walls were piled high with old paint cans, broken machinery, and cardboard cartons. Two snowblowers and a riding lawnmower occupied the center of the shed.
    Wishing she had a more powerful flashlight with her, Nancy began to search the shed. Just behind the mower, she found what she was looking for—a simple rectangular metal container painted red. She knelt down, taking care not to touch the can, and