An Angel in Disguise- The Complete Series Read online

  AN ANGEL IN DISGUISE

  * * *

  BOX SET

  MK LANSBURY

  www.mklansbury.com.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, places and characters are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real people, places, or events is entirely coincidental.

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication / use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Copyright @ 2018 MK Lansbury

  All rights reserved. Except as authorized under U.S. copyright law, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.

  Cover Design by Jun Ares

  Book Format by Darcy Werkman

  Website Design by Danny Everett

  Special Thanks to Anthony Del Col

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  FALLING: BOOK ONE

  RISING: BOOK TWO

  FIGHTING: BOOK THREE

  LIVING: BOOK FOUR

  FALLING

  * * *

  AN ANGEL IN DISGUISE

  BOOK 1

  MK LANSBURY

  “For it is written: “He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully.”

  - Luke 4:10

  “Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.”

  - Hebrews 13:2

  ONE

  * * *

  Strangers at a Funeral

  Teresa could feel the fillings in the back of her teeth buzzing.

  It felt like rain. Looked like rain. Dark clouds roamed in from the East, and the wind made the blades of grass around her leather boots dance.

  The boots matched her outfit: black. It was a good thing most of her wardrobe was black. There had been no need for last minute shopping for an appropriate dress. Xavier would have found that funny, Teresa thought. Or maybe not. She hadn’t spoken to her older brother in years; maybe he had changed drastically? She wouldn’t blame him if he had.

  Father Hogan droned on and on about ashes, dust, and the eternal soul. She wished he’d get it over with. Xavier’s coffin sat on the burial device like a sore thumb sticking out of the earth.

  Inhaling the sharp, fresh aroma of ozone, Teresa looked at the gravestone beside Xavier’s plot where her parents’ names were carved side by side, the date of their fatal car accident etched in stone, undeniable.

  “Amen.” Father Hogan closed his Bible with a snap. His hands were relatively smoother than the rest of him, wrinkled into papery folds. “Teresa, would you like to say something?”

  Her thoughts scattered like cockroaches skittering out of the light, leaving her frozen. She didn’t understand what Father Hogan could possibly expect from her. Didn’t she say everything at the church? What else was there?

  “Rest in peace,” she mumbled apologetically. She never was one to wax poetic. That was Xavier’s forte.

  Father Hogan looked disappointed, which was not a new sensation. She could still remember the Easter Egg Hunt when she was seven and Father Hogan had followed her wherever she went, making sure to guide other children to the eggs before she got to them. The memory always left a nasty taste in her mouth.

  The burial device kicked in and her heart skipped a beat. It finally hit her that Xavier was dead. Cold, unmoving, lifeless. His beaming face rushed up out of her memories; the huge lopsided smile, the bright brown eyes that always shone like a new penny, and the clear voice calling her name.

  Teresa!

  A tear surprised her as it spilled down her cheek, its warmth oddly comforting in the cold wind.

  She felt a nudge in her ribs. Vicky Poole, beside her, nodded toward the pile of dirt. Teresa managed to walk forward without stumbling, and she focused on the dirt itself. Its rich smell assaulted her nostrils and she couldn’t help but think of the irony of burying the dead in something so much alive. It even made music as it crashed against the hard wood of the coffin.

  Like the pitter-patter of rain.

  Having done her duty, she turned away, allowing the rest of the gathered to come forward and say their last goodbyes. She was immediately surrounded by well-wishers. She wished they’d do the well-wishing from a distance, preferably from the comforts of their own homes through a text or perhaps an email.

  “It’s so good to see you, Reese.” Mandy Poole ignored Teresa’s personal boundaries and enveloped her in a hug that smelled of cats and vinegar. As an old friend of her mother’s, she seemed to think she had that right. “Chicago must agree with you.”

  “Of course it does, Mom,” Mandy’s daughter Vicky said as she rolled her eyes; her short brown hair flew in the wind obscuring her face. “There’s a reason she doesn’t come here often.”

  Teresa heard the hidden barb in her old friend’s voice, the accusation and hurt, but she didn’t take the bait. While she hadn’t set foot in Park-on-Hudson in twelve years, she knew not much had changed. They had a Starbucks near the Interstate now, and she had counted three lingerie stores on the ride up to the house, but it was essentially the same upstate New York hamlet with its bed and breakfasts, the tourist influx in the summer, and the religious fervor of hard-working people.

  “My job keeps me busy,” she finally replied.

  It was a lie and they could tell the moment it slipped out of her mouth. Vicky’s jaw tightened as if Teresa had slapped her.

  “Will you be staying long?”

  “I have to wind up Xavier’s affairs before I can go. Should probably take me another two weeks, I guess.”

  “Horrible way to go.” Vicky nodded at the coffin halfway down the grave. “I mean, we hardly saw him except for the rare grocery run. When he returned, he had hoped he’d be a big part of the community. It’s sad to see him come to this end.”

  “It’s the undercurrent you have to worry about.” Mandy shook her head. “Once it catches you in its flow, only a miracle can save you. I guess it wasn’t in the cards for Xavier.”

  “The coroner said he hit his head against a rock at some point. He must have lost consciousness and drowned.” Vicky pushed her glasses back up her pert nose.

  Teresa closed off her ears to their conversation and let her eyes wander through the crowd, picking faces she had known from when she was in her teens. She stopped short at the sight of a man standing on the other side of the grave. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and his hair was the color of wheat fields. He was looking straight at her and it sent a thrill down her spine. She blinked and swallowed.

  She’d never seen him before, yet… that wasn’t right. She was as sure of knowing him as she was of never having set eye on him before. She frowned when she couldn’t put her finger on it.

  “… isn’t that right, Reese?”

  The use of her nickname was a hook, tugging her up to the surface, struggling to breathe.

  Mandy smiled kindly. “I said God is watching over you in this trying time.”

  She snorted and then tried to hide her exasperated derision.

  “I’m sorry. I… if you’ll excuse me, I need to thank Father Hogan for the service.”

  She turned away quickly, ignoring the understanding coos of Mandy Poole, and the hissing resentment of her daughter Vicky. She looked in the crowd for the familiar stranger, but he was nowhere to be found.

  TWO

  * * *

  Reunion of Two

  She was falling.

  The world whizzed past around her in a haze.
The air was thick and frigid. Her skin broke out in goosebumps.

  Where was she? Had she slipped? Had someone pushed her?

  She opened her mouth to scream but the only thing to escape her burning throat was a volley of bubbles. Water rushed into to replace them.

  It took her frenzied brain a moment to realize she was at the bottom of the river. She tried desperately to swim up to the surface, to fresh air, to life. But she was stuck.

  Below her, in the murky green depths of the river, she could see a pale hand clasping her bare ankle, its long clawed fingers drawing blood.

  The dread rising up in her throat choked her further. She tried to yank her leg out of the grip but only managed to lift up whoever was holding her down.

  It was Xavier.

  His complexion was green, his cheeks pitted where the fish had been nibbling petite morsels. What remained of his eyes looked at her menacingly, his teeth arranged in a malicious grin.

  And then, a loud knock echoed in the water. Xavier’s grin vanished.

  And then another knock… and another…

  Teresa realized then that she was dreaming. Instead of a slow drift up to the surface of consciousness, it was a jarring shake, leaving Teresa disoriented when her eyes opened. She groaned as she got up off the hardwood floor. Looking down at the family photo albums surrounding her, she realized it had been a mistake to go through them.

  “I know you’re in there,” a male voice stated. “You can’t hide forever.”

  She rolled her eyes but couldn’t help a smile. Stewart had always thought of himself as more important than he really was, but that hadn’t stopped her from dating him for a few weeks when they had been young and careless. Xavier hadn’t liked the idea of his best friend and his sister being an item, but Stewart had been her first boyfriend and she would have fought to be with him even if he had been a burning pile of human trash.

  She opened the door.

  Stewart grinned down at her. Prematurely bald at twenty-seven, he still had the rugged good looks of his youth. His blue eyes had faded a little and there were wrinkles around his mouth and forehead, but he was the same old Stewart.

  “I brought cinnamon rolls.”

  “You really weren’t going to take no for an answer.”

  “You know me.”

  He walked past her and into the living room, much more at home in her parents’ house than she was.

  “You want some coffee?” she offered.

  “Sure.” Stewart picked up an album and sat back on the rose pink sofa. “God, you kept pictures of this?”

  Teresa didn’t ask which picture he was talking about. They were all a lifetime ago, taken and cataloged lovingly by her mother. She grabbed two mugs of coffee. She preferred black; no surprises there. She put the pot of sugar and creamer on a tray with the mugs and headed to the living room.

  “So how you doing, Reese?”

  “How do you think I’m doing?” She took a sip of scalding coffee, letting her answer sink in. Stewart looked at her steadily, making her uncomfortable for deliberately misunderstanding his question. He could always call her out on her bullshit.

  “Man, I haven’t seen you since, what? College?”

  “Must be, yeah.”

  “How’s Chicago?”

  “It’s fine. I’m in the IT department of Adventa, a consumer goods packaging company. You’ve probably heard of them?”

  Stewart frowned, deep in thought. “Smallish company. Some of my clients have shares. It’s a solid company.”

  She snorted. “Thanks for the portfolio rundown. Still sounding like any other Wall Street banker, I see.”

  “Once you find your calling, it would be foolish to leave. Though I’ve also started to dabble in some start-ups. Like Xavier’s.”

  A prickly silence bloomed between them. Xavier’s startup, the disaster that had torn the siblings apart.

  “I didn’t know you’d invested.”

  “I had a sizable chunk as an angel investment.” Stewart stirred three spoons of sugar in his peat colored coffee. “I got some of my regular clients to come in, too.” He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I lost a few clients when it went belly up. I had to pay some out of pocket to keep them happy.”

  “I’m sorry.” She felt compelled to say it.

  “Don’t be.” He grinned. “It’s the nature of the game. My guardian angel must have been on vacation when I made that investment.”

  She scoffed. Teresa knew how religious Park-on-Hudson was, but it still surprised her how much the mention of God and angels in everyday conversation here blindsided her. It was one of the many reasons she had left.

  A slow smile crawled across Stewart’s lips. “I forgot you were agnostic.”

  “I’m surprised you still worship the one true God and not the bronze bull you have on Wall Street.” She arched an eyebrow and Stewart smiled.

  He put his mug down and picked up another photo album. She didn’t have to look at the pictures to know it was from her twelfth summer when she was all knobbly knees and elbows and her eyes were as big as tennis balls, just not as green. “Do you remember Camp Coolidge?”

  “I only went there every summer since I was ten,” Teresa mocked. Anxiety was a band around her midriff, narrowing down slowly.

  “Remember that time Xavier nearly drowned?” His voice was velvet soft. She swallowed hard, trying to shake the image of Xavier from her nightmare. “We thought he was a goner till the river spat him out.”

  Teresa remembered. She remembered sitting in her raft trying not to cry while Xavier and Stewart made fun of her non-existent skills. She remembered wishing her brother was dead and, as if some malicious being had been listening to her innermost thoughts, Xavier’s raft had grazed against an outcrop of rock, flipped over, and her brother was lost amongst the roiling rapids. And she remembered the relief when, after a few minutes of screaming herself hoarse, she saw her brother break out of the water, exactly as if someone had pushed him out and onto the safety of the rocky bank.

  She nodded and busied herself with a cinnamon roll. She didn’t want to remember.

  “Xavier talked about that a lot, you know.” Stewart broke off a bit of a roll from her plate. “He said he almost felt like someone’s hands were on his back.”

  “It must have been the panic. Tricks his mind was playing on him.”

  “He never feared water after that incident. He would go for a swim in the river every morning in the summers. I saw him. People who have near death experiences don’t make a habit of indulging in the same activity on a daily basis. Something gave Xavier the confidence.”

  And took hers away. Teresa hadn’t stepped inside any water, even the shallow end of a pool, since her brother’s near-death experience. Part of her still felt the whole incident was her fault.

  “I still don’t understand how a great swimmer like Xavier could drown.” She put the cinnamon roll away, suddenly not in the mood for sweet desserts when her mind was on such bitter things. “How do miracles and divine intervention explain that?”

  Stewart sighed. “It’s all part of some grand design, I guess. That gives me some comfort, at least.”

  “How can people be so sure about that?” Her hackles were raised; she hadn’t wanted to think about any of this and she certainly didn’t appreciate Stewart dredging up things that she had resolved years ago. Teresa could still hear her father extolling the power of prayer, yet none of her prayers were answered when he was fighting for his life in the ER.

  “I’m sorry, Teresa. I came to cheer you up and, well, I guess I suck at it.”

  She knew the proper response yet she couldn’t offer it.

  He changed the topic. “What are you going to do with this place?” She was so glad that Xavier was a better person than her at this moment. “Rent it out?”

  She looked around the living room. Not much had changed since she left there at eighteen. The walls were covered with pictures of the family, certificates Xavie
r and she had collected over the academic years, a baseball trophy her Dad won when he was a boy, and the vintage books her mother loved to collect.

  It was a lovely home in a picturesque location but she couldn’t afford to keep it. She, too, had invested in Xavier’s startup. Invested a lot. And she still hadn’t recovered financially from it. She was currently living paycheck to paycheck in a horrible two bedroom walk-up she shared with a struggling lawyer.

  “I was thinking of selling it. Once I’ve cleared out some of the things in here I could have a real estate agent take a look and put it on the market.”

  “Don’t do that.” Stewart smiled at her. “Let me take it off your hands. Have the place valued and sell it straight to me. No need to pay any middleman. And I’ll pay you above market value.”

  Teresa paused. The offer was more than generous but she couldn’t help but feel insulted by it. It irked her that someone had easy access to so much ready cash, and she couldn’t help but wonder at his hidden agenda. She had always looked a gift horse in the mouth because, more often than not, the teeth were rotten.

  “That’s really generous of you.” Her smile was rusty from disuse. “I’ll definitely think about it. But first I have a mess to go through.” She looked over at the cluttered living room and Stewart laughed. He got up and brushed his hands against his pants.

  “It’s great to have you back, Reese, even if it’s for a few days.”

  She let him hug her; she even hugged him back. Stewart was a lot of things, but he was most importantly a friend. She walked him to the door and watched him walk to his swanky new red car. She began to wonder if it would be rude to go back in while he was still in the driveway but then went back inside anyway.

  THREE