Edilio twisted in his seat. “What is it?”
What he saw shocked him. Orsay’s eyes were wide, glittering whites showing all around.
“What’s with her?” Bug asked in a quivering voice.
“Orsay. Are you okay?” Edilio asked.
Her only answer was a moaning sound so unearthly that at first Edilio didn’t realize it was coming from her. It seemed to generate from her chest, a sound too deep for this frail girl. It was something closer to an animal growl.
“Girl’s crazy,” Bug moaned.
Orsay began to tremble. The trembling escalated until she was shaking, in spasm, like a person being electrocuted. Her tongue protruded from her mouth, gagging her.
She was biting her tongue. Like she was trying to bite it off.
“Hey!” Edilio slammed the glove compartment open and yanked everything out with frantic fingers, screwdriver, flashlight, a thick digital tire gauge. He grabbed the tire gauge and pushed his way into the backseat. He yelled, “Grab her, hold her!” to Bug, who instead shrank away.
Edilio grabbed her by the hair, there was nothing else he could hold with one hand, twisted his fist into her hair until he had a firm purchase, yanked her head forward, and shoved the tire gauge between her teeth.
Her jaws clamped hard, so hard, they cracked the plastic of the tire gauge. Blood flowed from her mouth, but her teeth no longer closed on her tongue.
“Hold that in her mouth!” Edilio yelled at Bug.
Bug just stared, paralyzed.
Edilio yelled a curse and said, “Do it or I swear I will shoot you!”
Bug snapped out of his trance and grabbed Orsay’s head with his hands.
Edilio threw the Jeep into reverse and began backing up as fast as he could go, down the path. The first he noticed of the coyotes was when he felt a bump and heard a canine yelp of pain.
One hand on the wheel, yelling in fear, Edilio smashed the Jeep into an embankment. He threw it into drive, advanced a few feet to get clear, threw it, gears grinding into reverse again as a huge, snarling face appeared beside him. Coyote teeth slavered and tore at the plastic.
Edilio snap-aimed and fired. The burst was short, maybe five rounds, but more than enough to dissolve the coyote’s head into red mist.
Down they bumped, down the path, smashing and jolting. Edilio could barely hold the wheel.
Then, suddenly, they were on flat terrain. He spun the wheel as two coyotes hurled themselves at the plastic sheath. The impact of their bodies was so great, it pushed the plastic in and slammed Edilio’s arm, knocking his hand off the wheel, stunning him.
But his foot was on the gas pedal and he floored it. The Jeep plowed straight toward a building. Edilio grabbed the wheel, slammed on the brakes, twisted hard, fish-tailed into a two-wheel turn, and roared away from the ghost town.
The coyote pack followed for a while, then fell away as it became clear that they would never catch the speeding car.
Bug still had Orsay in a headlock. But she was making more reasonable sounds, now, seeming to ask to be freed.
“Let her go,” Edilio ordered.
Bug released Orsay.
She wiped blood with the back of her hand. Edilio found a rag in the debris of the glove compartment and handed it back to her.
“It told me to chew my tongue off,” she gasped at last.
“What?” Edilio snapped. “What? Who?”
“Him. It. He told me to chew my tongue off and I couldn’t resist,” she cried. “He didn’t want me to be able to tell you.”
“Tell us what? What?” Edilio demanded, desperate and confused.