His bedroom on the second floor smelled of herbs hung under the steepled ceiling. One corner of the blanket was invitingly folded open on the football-stadium sized bed. About three dozen or so pillows littered it like an insomniac's wet dreams.

He yearned to snuggle and sleep, but the jetlag said nope. This left him with two choices. He could count the pillows or pace, wringing his hands. And watch for the first sliver of the rising sun, antsy for his answers. It was going to be a long, long night.

There was the third recourse, to search the warrens of the Internet. He cringed, as he googled Liam Anders expecting the worst. And Google delivered.

By sunrise, he dropped the iPad like it was a hissing cobra and went to stare out of the window. His breathing came in gasps. Liam, his easy charmer Liam, had hidden so much, if he believed the Internet... nothing that explained this trip or why Liam dragged him here like a blind kitten. Genetic research was for labs and universities in huge cities, not for this American version of Slobodinsk in Montana's wilderness. But still, Liam was hiding a lot from him. Not that he had to believe everything he'd read on the Internet, but, but, but...

"Come on, sun. Get your lazy butt over the horizon already." Volya tapped his fingers on the windowsill. He desperately needed his answers. "Come on!"

Finally, the first glow in the eastern sky revealed the hillside meadows sloping towards a tree-bound river. Aspens, by the way their leaves rippled in the wind. Any minute now, the sky would change to blood-red, and the disk of the sun would float up into the sky. It would be heart-achingly pretty.

It even had a musical score to go with it.

Wait what?! What musical score?

He must have imagined the troubled chords. It must have been buzzing in his ears, still a bit plugged after the transatlantic flight. But no, who was he kidding? Never in his life could he have imagined a melody this poignant and thrilling at the same time!

The tune played somewhere inside the house.

On silent feet, Volya padded out of his room. He descended the staircase to the ground floor, then followed the hall to a hexagonal extension at the southern end of the house.

There, the architect added a single room, arranged around a large river rock and glass fireplace. It had a dining table, big enough for a dozen people, with high-backed chairs around it and a deadwood chandelier above. More rustic furniture was scattered throughout the space in an artistic disarray. It invited visitors into nooks for spontaneous conversations, reading and other quiet pastimes. Large windows looked out on the flowerbeds.

It was all very pretty, yes, but Volya's gaze barely scanned past it.

The most important thing in the room was a stage against the blind log wall, where the floor was raised a step. A great fortepiano would have fit right in, but instead, the stage was occupied by a giant two-level keyboard.

Liam perched on a stool by it. His eyes were closed. His fingers searched their way through or toward something, key by key, ignoring the music sheets on the pulpit.

The Internet had told Volya that Liam's dad was an NBA player—that explained Liam's height, alright. Liam's mother was Cole's first wife, currently living in Boston. The tragic lady on the porch, Lydia, was the ex-wife number two and the mother of Liam's half-sister, Anabelle. Liam's father had recently landed in rehab after separating from the third Mrs. Anders amidst a broiling scandal. And the scandal was—

Liam had found what he was looking for, the next musical phrase he wanted. He repeated it twice, then added something to it on the third pass. Something that Volya couldn't identify, but it brought the time to a standstill.

Despite the den being stuffed with tempting furniture, Volya lowered his butt on the hardwood floor by the crackling fire and crossed his legs. He couldn't take his eyes off Liam.

All these divorces and scandals should have left a smudge on Liam... and he didn't smell any of it. Liam had tricked him before with his stupid heart-stopping smiles and general goofiness. Now, he tricked Volya's instincts again. Before him, was a completely different Liam, as far from the mundane as a guy could be. He looked so... fulfilled, until the music stopped.

Liam lifted his gaze from the keys. In a heartbeat, he'd turn to Volya, and their glances would meet... they did.

"Couldn't sleep?" Liam asked slowly, in English.

Volya sifted through his memory until he found the correct words. They came out of his mouth uncomfortably, like spitting jagged rocks. "Yes, because of jetlag. You?"

Liam pulled the phone from his pocket, starting the app, ignoring Marina's orders once again. Was his English this bad? Damn.

"I have a lot on my mind," Liam confessed via the electronics.

Volya searched his features for that underlying strain that overshadowed the glimmers of joy from his improv. It wasn't hard to find.

"Is it about..." Volya started stubbornly in English but didn't know how to finish his question to get to genetic memory and other stuff that bothered him. "Me?" That was rather emo, but it covered a lot of ground in a single short word.

"How do you like Montana?" Liam replied to a question with a question, and the app diligently interpreted it. It needn't have bothered—Volya's English course covered rubbish like that. He knew all the stock answers.

"It's very pretty," Volya replied diplomatically in English, but there was no fooling Liam.

"I'm sorry." Liam chuckled. "You probably imagined something grand like New York or L.A. I promise to take you anywhere you wish to go after... hmm..."

Oh, for the sake of all that is holy! Volya gave up on English, crying out in his native tongue, "Liam, why the heck did you bring me here? What do you want with me? Who is sick?"

Liam glanced at the sunshine filtering through the window. "Hmm, I think it's late enough.

Volya groaned in exasperation. "Late enough for what?"

"It's easier to show than tell. Please, walk with me."

They trekked the gravel path leading away from the parking lot in front of the main house and came to a meadow. On one side, aspens shaded a gingerbread-bright cottage. Next to it, rocks stuck out of the ground between shrubs trimmed into whimsical shapes. It was the craziest garden Volya had ever seen, but his eyes skimmed right past the horticultural marvels.

A slim girl was riding a horse through the wildflowers.

No.

A girl riding a horse was what Volya's mind desperately wished he were seeing, not what his eyes actually saw.

What he saw was impossible.

The prancing rider on the meadow had the torso of a teenage girl, dressed into a neon-pink crop-top, showing off her belly button... which was normal for a teenage girl in the summer. What wasn't normal was that the crop-top also revealed a line where the girl's waistline joined the body of the horse.

A centaur, this is called a centaur, was Volya's first coherent thought. His second was: That's it. I've gone bonkers.

"Morning!" Liam hollered.

The centaur wheeled around, front hooves dancing through the air. "Liam!"

Volya recovered enough by then to point a shaking finger. "That's... I mean, how's she a centaur?"

The centaur tossed her hair, pulled up in a ponytail. Her cheeks pinked with exertion. The smile lit up the world with an extra million watts of happiness. Volya had seen this smile countless times in the past three days. Her skin was a lighter shade of brown than Liam's, and she had the same fragility to her mouth that Lydia did. The same narrow chin. But her wide-set eyes, her nose and her cheekbones came from the same mold as the popstar's.

She wasn't just a creature of ancient myth come to life.

This could only be Anabelle, Liam's half-sister.