Ellis found Clay the next morning at dawn standing at the bank of the Brazos River. How long he’d been standing there, she couldn’t tell, but he was not so wrapped up in thought that he didn’t turn to watch her approach.

“End or beginning of the watch?” she asked him as she handed him the cup of coffee she’d brought.

Clay accepted the coffee with thanks and took a sip. “The watch never ends when you are a soldier.”

For lack of a better response, she nodded. The always-brown water glowed a deep gold under the rising sun. Out of habit, she searched for snakes but found no evidence of them.

“We found you over there,” she said as she indicated the reeds where the pirogue had been located. “You were lying in the boat unconscious.”

“What happened to the boat?”

Ellis met his stare. “It was your resting place for the first two days. We feared moving you would do more harm than good, so my mother padded the space around you with quilts in hopes it wouldn’t be too uncomfortable.”

He offered a wry smile. “I do not remember any discomfort associated with my bed.”

She matched his grin. “Yes, I would imagine you had other concerns. After we were sure we could move you, we brought in a bed and returned the pirogue to the neighbors.”

“The neighbors?” Clay shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

“I thought I told you.” She caught herself. “I’m sorry. You likely don’t remember that I explained the pirogue had been stolen a few days before you arrived at Velasco with the Greys. I knew you couldn’t have stolen it because I saw you leave the ship from New Orleans and knew exactly when you reached Texas soil. Thus, you could not be the thief.”

“And yet you found me in a stolen boat.” He took another sip of coffee and let that statement settle between them. “Just one of the mysteries.”

A cool breeze off the river drifted past, and Ellis tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. The air was crisp this morning, a warning of the winter to come.

Much as she disliked the heat of summer, she hated the chill of winter.

“I need to speak to your neighbor,” he said. “He might have an idea of who took his pirogue.”

“You could do that,” she said. “His house is down the main road to the south. But he will tell you he saw nothing and only noticed the pirogue was gone well after it was stolen.”

“How could he tell that?”

Ellis shrugged. “I don’t know. But that is what he told Mama and me when we returned the pirogue.”

“And you didn’t question him?”

She gave the soldier a pointed look. “My mother and I had just delivered a pirogue several miles downriver with two fidgety boys. The last thing we were thinking of at that point was interrogating Mr. Vaughn as to why his boat was stolen.”

“Your point is taken,” he said. “I just find it strange that the owner would realize a boat was gone and then somehow know it had been gone awhile before he noticed it.”

“Clay,” she said wearily, “are you certain you’re not missing a memory of having been an investigator before your accident?”

His expression sobered. “I’m certain of nothing.”

“Oh,” she said quickly. “I didn’t mean to be so insensitive. You just seem very good at seeing the details.”

Clay took another sip of coffee. “Except the details in my past.”

“But you saw something yesterday. That house, mountains, trees …” She paused. “And you were able to concentrate and switch from Acadian French to English. You haven’t gone back to French, just in case you weren’t sure.”

“I wasn’t,” he said. “Though I hadn’t thought about it.”

“Well,” Ellis said slowly, “maybe the key to getting back the important memories is to concentrate on trying to recall them.”

“I have been doing that,” he snapped. “It doesn’t help when you won’t answer my direct questions.”

“Like what?” she asked.

“You know what I am supposed to bring with me to that meeting at Mission San Jose. Why won’t you just tell me?”

He’d allowed his frustration to cause trouble again. Though he couldn’t remember most of what happened up until the day he awakened in the barn, he had an innate sense that his temper had always been his downfall.

Clay turned to face the beautiful lady who had saved his life and offered his most penitent expression. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “I don’t know much about myself, but I do know that I don’t take well to having missing pieces of what is an important puzzle.” He paused. “I also don’t like getting shot at.”

“Nor do I,” she agreed. “But that is part of what it means to live in a land at war.”

The truth of her statement hit him hard. Here was this family—wife and children—who had made a choice to remain on their land despite the fact that they were living in dangerous times.

“Dare I ask what you’re thinking?” she said. “Other than why I won’t answer your question regarding what you need to bring with you to Mission San Jose?”

“Won’t or can’t?” he asked.

“The result is the same,” she said evenly, obviously refusing to rise to his level of irritation.

And it was. Something in him settled then. The hard jolt of anger softened, and his hands unclenched.

He looked at her then, really looked beyond the beauty of her face to the strength of her spirit. “I am thinking that you are much braver than I ever was.”

Ellis laughed. “I doubt that. I am regularly terrified. It was all I could do to remain cowering in the brush while you went out and challenged whoever it was who had followed us. You are the brave one.”

His fingers wrapped around the coffee mug, but they would have preferred to wrap around the auburn curls that escaped from Ellis’s braid. He would leave soon, heading toward Mission San Jose, though he did not yet know what awaited him there.

He would miss her. Terribly.

And for a man whose mind was unreliable at best, he knew that standing here at the river’s edge with a good cup of coffee and Ellis Valmont was a memory he would always have.

Clay shook off the thought and finished the coffee in silence. After walking Ellis to the house, he set off to have a conversation with the neighbor. He found the man standing at the edge of his property looking down the road.

The man was younger than he expected with dark hair and a suspicious look on his tanned face. Clay studied him to try to make a determination of whether he might be Texian or from farther south of the border, but his features were of the sort that allowed a man to pass unnoticed among a number of cultures.

“You Mr. Vaughn?” he asked.

After introducing himself, Clay added, “I wonder if I could speak to you about that pirogue you had stolen.”

“No need to,” he said. “My neighbors returned it. Said there was a man shot up in it, which is why it came back bloodstained. What interest is it of yours?”

“It was my blood staining that pirogue. I’d say that gives me a strong interest.” He allowed that to sink in, then added, “I’d be much obliged if I could look at it.”

Vaughn seemed to consider the request, and then he nodded. “Come on, then.”

They walked together toward the river where the pirogue was leaning against an outbuilding that appeared to be a smokehouse. “Miss Valmont says you didn’t see who took it.”

“She’d be correct,” he said, displaying enough of an accent to identify the man as possibly being Acadian from south Louisiana. “But it isn’t the first one I’ve lost. Didn’t think I’d get this one back.”

Clay turned to look over at the man. “Don’t you find it odd that you keep getting boats stolen?”

He removed his hat to run his hand through thick black curls, then replaced his hat on his head. “I find it more odd that I actually got one back.” He paused. “Mr. Gentry, we are a country at war. There was a battle fought just down the river at Velasco not four years ago, and we will have battles come to this river again. You watch. So during times of war, things happen. Boats disappear.”

Clay nodded. “That’s a fair assessment. Do you figure the thief was friend or foe?”

“I figure it doesn’t matter. Result was the same. Until war came here, we all lived together in relative peace. Whether you were of Mexican descent—we prefer the term Tejano—or had come here from other places and call yourself a Texian, we were all one people, you know? Then came talk of freedom from Mexico and suddenly no one knew which side your friends and neighbors were on.”

Clay couldn’t disagree, so he decided to turn the conversation in a different direction. “Have you seen any strangers around here lately?”

Vaughn chuckled. “I’m looking at one right now.”

“Fair enough,” Clay said. “But I’m thinking in specific about one, maybe two men who I caught shadowing Miss Valmont over on their property. He aimed a rifle at me but it misfired.” He paused. “Mine didn’t misfire.”

“You think you hit him?”

“I know I did.” He shrugged. “I didn’t go after him because I was with Miss Valmont at the time. I felt it more important to see her safely home rather than hunt down the intruder and take the chance that he was not alone.”

“I would have done the same.” He shook his head. “Sad news about Boyd and Thomas. I promised him I would look in over at his place while he was away, but I’ve been remiss in my duties. I will do better.”

“What sad news?” Clay asked.

He shook his head. “Didn’t they tell you? Father and son went off together to defend the cannons at Gonzales back in September. Any man not returned or accounted for is considered now to be lost.”

“Lost?” He shook his head. “Are you saying Ellis’s father and brother are dead?”

“I am saying that’s common knowledge here.”

He shifted his stance. “So everyone around here knows that this family has no men in residence?”

“I suppose. Why?”

Because now that he knew this, Clay also knew he could never leave Ellis and her family there alone and unprotected. “No reason,” he said instead.

Later that evening as he and Jean Paul held their nightly chat on the porch after Ellis had gone up to bed, he broached the topic of Boyd Valmont. “I’d been thinking of checking into the fellow next door’s story about his missing pirogue, the one I drifted up on.”

“Is that right?” Jean Paul asked.

“It is,” he said. “So I spoke with him today. He didn’t have much to add. Just that it had come up missing and then Ellis and her mama had returned it.”

“That they did,” he said.

“Kind of dangerous, what with who knows who is out there, don’t you think?” he said.

Jean Paul swiveled to face him. “What do you mean? Has there been another threat to my family?”

“Nothing specific, but you said yourself that war is coming.” He paused. “It might already be here.”

“It might,” he said. “Though I am not convinced that one shot in the woods the other day scared off the entire Mexican army. More likely a couple of renegades or some deserters looking for a place to hide and food for their bellies.”

“They were shadowing Ellis. I saw them.” He shook his head. “I saw him. Just the one. But I saw evidence of what looked to be more than one.”

The old man’s frown was evident even by moonlight. “How many more?”

“Hard to say, but probably just one more.” He sat quietly in hopes that Mr. Valmont might say something else. When he did not, Clay continued. “I’m worried about the women being out here without men. I know you mentioned that Ellis’s mother is away right now with the little ones. Might she have gone with them?”

“She might have,” he said. “Had there not been a need to take care of you. I certainly couldn’t have done it. And you were in no shape to do it yourself.”

Guilt slammed him nearly backward. “Ellis is here and in danger because of me.”

A statement, not a question. Also a situation he could remedy.

“Didn’t say that.”

Clay frowned. “Yes. You did.”

The older man rose and stretched out his back, a sure sign the conversation was done and he intended to head for bed. Then he turned back to Clay, his face now in shadows and his expression unreadable.

“When Boyd came to me with this wild idea of taking up arms to defend the cause of Texas freedom, I told him he had plumb lost his mind. He had a wife and children here to take care of. He had a home he’d built by hand and a farm that he’d put everything he had into. Know what he said?”

“What?”

“He said, ‘Pa, if I don’t go do this, how will I live with the fact I could have given them not just a better house or a better farm, but a better life?’” Mr. Valmont shook his head. “My son went off to give his family a life where they could be here and be free. His eldest went with him for the same reason, and oh, if you knew Thomas, you’d know he was as stubborn as his father.”

And his sister, Clay thought.

“So away they went, but not before they offered the chance to talk them out of it. See, all I had to do was tell them I didn’t intend to look after Sophie and the children, and neither of them would have set foot off the property.” He let out a long breath. “It was an impossible choice, but I made it.”

He left Clay with those words, trudging off at a pace that was far slower than on previous nights.

“Sir,” Clay called over his shoulder before the man disappeared inside. “You made the right choice.”

The door hinges squeaked, and he figured he would get no answer. Silence fell. Then he heard the old man clear his throat. Finally the hinges creaked again as the door closed behind him, leaving Clay alone in the dark.

As was his habit, Clay moved from the porch to the stairs and settled there beneath the stars. Could he have made a choice like that? A decision to give up someone he loved for the greater good?

Somehow he knew this was a decision he had never faced. It was more than a thought. It was knowledge. He did as Ellis suggested and thought harder. Tried to form in his mind the missing information that would offer more than just an idea of how things were.

Of what had happened.

Of whose side he must be on.

He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. Gradually he became aware that he was being watched. His hand went to the pistol at his side.

Then he heard the footsteps and knew the only threat was to his heart. “Ellis?” he said without turning around.

“How did you know?” she said as she settled beside him on the steps.

He shrugged. “I’m sure I would have an answer if I could remember one. What are you doing out here?”

She was still fully dressed as if she hadn’t been upstairs asleep, and she wore a quilt around her shoulders for warmth. “I was waiting for Grandfather Valmont to go to bed. I wanted to speak with you alone.”

He gave her a sideways look and tried not to notice how beautiful she looked by moonlight. “How did you know I would be out here?”

Ellis ignored the question to look past him out toward the river. He followed her gaze but said nothing more.

Of course. She was as watchful of what happened here as he was.

A companionable silence fell between them. Finally Clay spoke. “I haven’t remembered, but I know which side I am on.”

She seemed to understand his cryptic comment, for she merely nodded. After a moment, she added, “You don’t have to tell me.”

“I am on your side,” he told her. “I owe you the debt of my life. I will not betray that. So tell me what I have to do and I will do it.”