Lightning Angel (Lovestruck Lightning #1)

Prologue

Tristan Knight was not an ordinary boy. But only a handful of people knew that. And the high school girls gaping after him as he drove past them in his new—or not so new—SUV were not one of them.

This was his first time driving his new possession, although driving out of his neighborhood, especially into town, wasn’t part of the plan. But somehow, he ended up in the square of Harmony Hills.

There was no familiar face or usual spot for him to stop. So he kept driving.

The sky was bright and blue, not a single puff of cloud to spot. Since there hadn’t been a warning ping on his phone about upcoming rain or thunderstorms, he relaxed into the seat after another peek at the sky.

He would head back home in half an hour.

Though Tristan hadn’t been to the town square more than a handful of times in all his years, he always knew his way back and forth. It was one of the perks of being, well, him —and no, it didn’t require knowing the directions.

But to his credit, he did know.

The townspeople bustled about their day. Coffee shops and restaurants were packed. School pupils walked or skateboarded on the sidewalks. A woman poked her head out of a flower shop and stared at him curiously as Tristan rode past her building.

He wouldn’t be surprised if she thought he was new to town, or that he was a passing tourist; that’s what everyone thought when they first saw him. And when they learned he was Dr. Knight’s son, their shock was always palpable.

He couldn’t blame them. He wasn’t an outdoorsy person. All his life, he had been isolated from the world as possible—thanks to his aunt.

Tristan grimaced and looked out the windshield. One thought of his aunt killed his mood; it always did, as rarely as he remembered her. In his frustration, he groped for another thought to distract him and sped up the car.

Right. His car.

Despite being twenty-one, knowing how to drive, and being the son of an infamous doctor, Tristan had never owned a car. Sure, he’d driven his dad’s sedan several times around their neighborhood. But that was it.

His dad had attempted to buy him one several times but Tristan had always protested. Why did an indoor person like him even want a car? The motorcycle his godfather gifted him on his eighteenth birthday still sat in the garage, barely ridden .

Besides, being him, Tristan didn’t really need a vehicle to go from one place to another—not that he went anywhere besides his cousins’ house.

So, it was a surprise when he saw an SUV roll into their courtyard yesterday afternoon. A tall boy, who seemed slightly younger than Tristan himself, with dark skin and icy-blonde hair, had been the driver. He shook hands with Dad, handed him the key and a file of papers, and left after one solemn look at the car.

Tristan didn’t realize what was going on until his dad told him that he bought the car from the daughter of one of his patients who passed away just the other day. The man’s family needed money for the funeral, and his daughter wanted to sell her car. Dad had jumped in to buy it from her, desperate to help them. The patient was an old friend of his.

The decision had been quick, and the car was now Tristan’s.

He felt immensely bad for the girl, whoever she was, losing her dad and her car in the span of one day.

Tristan sighed.

Another group of high school girls turned to look at him from the sidewalk as he took the right turn and rode past them, still not sure where he was going. They paused and stared, some dropping their jaws, and some gasping and whispering to each other.

Tristan listened to what they were saying about him. It was all the same everywhere he went. Every woman regardless of age thought he was drop-dead gorgeous, that even Edward Cullen couldn’t hold a candle to him.

He rolled his eyes.

Eventually, he passed a two-story, white and brick- red-painted building, with a wide courtyard surrounded by half walls. Tristan read the billboard and realized it was a church. Just as he was about to look away, he spotted his dad’s blue sedan. He would recognize it anywhere.

Tristan stopped the car. This must be where the funeral of his dad’s friend was being held.

He parked the car down the street and walked back toward the church building, rolling up the sleeves of his black button-down. The perk of black being your signature dress code was that you could stop in the middle of the road and walk into a funeral unplanned. Not that Tristan went around his neighborhood attending funerals. This was his first one in years; the last one being his mother’s and sister’s.

His chest tightened suddenly. It had been years, but the pain was still afresh. He clenched his fists and took a deep breath to compose himself.

When he reached the wide-open gates, Tristan hesitated for a moment before he stepped into the courtyard. He wasn’t a church-going person, or religious. Religion hadn’t gotten him or his family anywhere. God had never cared for him, so Tristan didn’t care about Him either. Though, his dad was a believer.

The speech from inside the building floated to him. Tristan climbed the steps to the portico and reached for the door.

“Thank you, all of you. Like Cassie said, we are thankful you are here with us today.”

Tristan opened the door and stepped into the deserted foyer. He spied the closed doorway ahead of him, where the vulnerable female voice came through the microphone and walked toward it. He didn’t know why he was here, why he had decided to stop just because he saw his dad’s car and was daring to enter a religious building to attend the funeral of someone he didn’t know.

He just did.

“Everyone who knew Mark Ford knows that he was always cool, easy-going, and carefree about everything; he was the same even on his deathbed. When Dad told me four days ago that he wanted me to sing I Can Only Imagine at his funeral, I scolded him and told him he wasn’t going to die. He told me to promise him, and I did, saying I would sing it for him when he died of old age—”

Perhaps it was better if no one saw him.

Tristan decided and slipped into the room—a hall, rather—unseen in a way only he could do; being him had a lot of perks even though it came with a great pain. The moment he was inside, his eyes scanned the room.

That’s when he saw her.

On the dais, in front of the coffin that held her dad’s body, stood a tall and slender girl in a knee-length black dress. Hoop earrings dangled from her earlobes and a cross necklace rested at her throat. Her dark, wavy hair was pinned to the sides and her hazel eyes were glassy, her mascara smudged, and her nose and cheeks red from crying.

Though everything about her looked vulnerable, Tristan couldn’t help but notice the air of boldness about her.

She was everything he had never seen before. So he stood still and stared as she continued her speech.

“—but Dad was so sure his time on earth was nearing its end, that he was going Home to his Savior. He made me promise him, so… this is for him.”

The girl paused and exchanged a glance with the blonde standing to her left. That was when Tristan noticed her too. She seemed to be around his age, and he assumed them to be sisters even though they didn’t look anything alike. From what he heard from his dad, the friend who passed away had two daughters.

The older girl gave her a soft, encouraging look, and the other girl began singing.

“ I can only imagine what it would be like… ”

And lightning struck Tristan in the heart.

Even though it was merely a feeling , he was highly aware of the aliveness filling him and flowing through his veins. His heart flared to life.

She had the voice of an angel. Not that he had heard an angel before, but she sounded like how an angel would.

Tears ran down her face as she sang, eyes closed, her angelic voice shaking and often breaking. When she stopped after a few more lines, Tristan wished she hadn’t. He wanted to hear more; he wanted to keep listening to her heavenly voice as long as he could.

Unfortunately, she was unable to continue. Yet, she refused to break down in front of everyone. She stepped down from the dais with her sister and took her seat in the front row as a man took to the stage for his speech.

Tristan moved to the front. No eyes saw him. No one was aware of his presence in the room. He reached the front row and saw her seated between her sister and— Tristan blinked —the dark-skinned boy from yesterday who dropped off the SUV at his house .

The girl dabbed her eyes with a tissue and blew her nose, dragging Tristan’s gaze from the boy to her. Something inside him tightened and softened at the same time. Just when the strange desire to comfort her rose in him, he saw the boy taking her hand and intertwining their fingers. He lifted their joined hands and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.

The girl offered him a weak smile.

He must be her boyfriend, Tristan thought.

But that didn’t stop him from watching her intently, almost unblinkingly. He wanted to figure her out. No lightning had ever struck him in the heart; nor had it ever filled him with aliveness. She, however, did, with immense force and intensity that went through him.

The feeling was unworldly, illogical, and exhilarating at the same time.

Tristan felt like he could stare at her all his life and never get bored. Like he could listen to her voice until his last breath and never get enough. Who was this girl that had lured him like a siren with her song? He wanted to know her, and he wouldn’t back off until he did.

Even the fact that she had a boyfriend wouldn’t stop him.