Broken Angel

Chapter 1 She was a mystery from the start. But was she a miracle? The yellow Oldsmobile idled in the gravel and dirt parking lot, in front of a No Place Idaho greasy spoon called Canyon Jack’s. I’m a coward, he thought. I should just cut her throat and drop her in the river. He couldn’t make himself do it though. He was afraid. He was already cursed. He didn’t want to be damned. “What are we going to do with her?” His girlfriend sat beside him, hands clenched in her lap. Waiting for him to do something. Anything. The girl sat in back, slumped against the passenger side door. Eyes open, but not awake. Breathing, blinking only when the autopilot in her brain told her to do so. Just a piece of living meat. The ghost inside the machine was subdued. For now. “What are we going to do with her?” his girlfriend asked. “We’re going to leave her here,” he said at last. She glanced back at the girl behind them, gave her a look both frightened and sympathetic. “We can’t leave her. She’s your sister.” “No,” he said. “She’s not my sister.” “Then what is she?” He focused on the rearview mirror, watching the monster in the back seat. She’d moved, or at least he’d imagined she had. Then her unfocused eyes turned toward the mirror, found his, made the short hairs on his neck prickle. “What is she?” Raw desperation cracked her voice. “I don’t know.”