The Year of Chasing Dreams by Lurlene McDaniel Page A

don’t want to,” Ciana confessed. “But timing’s never been right for us. Not yet, anyway.”
    They both must have thought of Arie at the same time, because Eden quickly switched gears. “Do you know what I think?” she asked. “I think Olivia really liked Roy. You know that bad-boy attraction thingy we girls get over guys who don’t deserve us.” She spoke from experience having faced up to her almost fatal attraction to Tony.
    “Well, now I’m curious. Was raised to believe she only loved Grandpa Charles. Who knew such a villain was lurking in her past?” Ciana dragged a hank of hair across her upper lip to imitate a mustache. “Yes, this bad boy needs to be investigatedfurther. Detective Ciana on the job!” And so began her research for any mention of bad boy Roy Soder in the diaries.

    Ciana woke one night to the sound of engines revving and racing in the distance. Sleepily, she got up, wrapped a quilt around her shoulders, slipped on wool boot slippers, and went out onto the veranda. The sound was louder, with a consistent whine, but not close. She could see nothing unusual on the lawn or at the barn. The night was cold, and she shivered. Yet she didn’t sleep well the rest of the night, and very early the next morning she saddled up her horse and rode out across her pastures toward where she’d heard the noise.
    Just as night darkness faded to morning gray, she came up to her best alfalfa pastures and reined in Firecracker. The horse stamped and snorted away ice crystals forming on her nose. Ciana stared at her fields, dumbfounded. The fences lay broken in several places, and the earth had been gouged full of wide grooves. ATVs. Her best acreage had been vandalized, run over every which way by all-terrain vehicles. Ciana urged her horse forward over the downed fence and rode onto the scarred ground to survey the damage, which looked extensive. She shook angrily, cursed the riders, rode home, and called the police.
    “What did the sheriff say?” Alice Faye poured Ciana another cup of coffee and set the pot on the table.
    The sun was high now, but Ciana had spent the whole morning with Sheriff Frazier, walking her land and filing a report. “He says it’s just bored kids. Not much he can do unless I catch them red-handed. Like that’s going to happen.” She fumed. “What am I supposed to do? Sit out by my fields all night with my shotgun?”
    “Look, the ground can be plowed out once it thaws. Asfor the fences, you’ll have to repair them. When’s Jon coming back? He’ll help.”
    “I don’t need Jon to fix a fence,” Ciana growled. “I’m not some helpless twit!”
    “My, my. Testy, aren’t you? Frankly, I like having Jon around. Don’t you?”
    Ciana grabbed her coat from the back of her kitchen chair, refusing to engage in her mother’s baited question. “I’ll get started. Need to go into town for materials, though. If Willis will sell the stuff, what with me being a mere girl and all.”
    “No need to be crabby. You know I’ll lend a hand if you need it. And, Ciana, there’s no shame in taking help.”
    Ciana felt a twinge of guilt. She didn’t really want Alice Faye outside in the cold stringing fence line and handling barbed wire. “You want anything while I’m in town?” she asked, her tone subdued.
    “Not today. But thanks for asking.”
    Ciana stomped outside and into the brittle cold, muttering under her breath all the way to her old truck.

    From the moment she stepped inside Willis’s Lumber and Feed Store on Main Street, Ciana felt as if she were on display. It wasn’t her imagination either. She heard people whisper, noticed them avoiding eye contact with her. Ciana set about gathering the wire and new metal posts she’d need to repair her fences, working quickly in order to get away from the glances and stares. At the cash register, as the clerk rang her up, Ted Sawyer Jr. came up alongside her. He was a few years older than her, but everyone called him