Katie pressed down on the accelerator and the engine roared.

“It’s a fast little bastard,” Bruce said, still looking rearward.

“But not faster than this,” Katie said. “Right?”

Bruce sighed. “Hard to say. A lot of these new electric cars, they’re so light they move pretty quick.”

“I gotta call my mom,” Katie said.

“Why?”

“She’s at the thing, you know, the big event for these cars. If there’s something wonky with them, she should know. Or maybe she does know what’s happening.”

She took one hand off the wheel, dug out her phone again, held her thumb on the home button to bring it to life, and handed it to Bruce. “Go into the contacts and call up Mom. You know how to do that?”

He scowled. “No, all I’ve ever used is a string and two tin cans.”

“Okay, fine.”

Bruce tapped on the contacts, found Mom and tapped again. He had the phone to his ear. “When she answers, I’ll hand it to you.”

Katie kept her eyes forward as she nodded. The road had been flat and straight the last few miles, but there were some windy curves ahead. The car lurched as she entered the first one at sixty. Katie grimaced as the tires squealed.

“Easy,” Bruce said, phone to his ear. “These babies weren’t exactly built for cornering.”

Katie looked in the mirror again. The Arrival, lighter and more aerodynamic and built lower to the ground, rounded the curve with relative ease.

Bruce took the phone away from his ear and pressed a button to end the call. “No answer,” he said. “I hung up when it went to message.”

“Okay,” Katie said, swallowing. “Maybe it’s just as well. I’d have had to explain why Archie’s not with me. Will this road take us to the mall?”

“We make a turn about four miles up,” Bruce said. The Cadillac didn’t have a mirror on the passenger door, so he had to keep turning around to see how close the Arrival was getting. “Not giving up,” he said.

They’d come out of the curves and were back on a straight stretch again.

“You sure there’s no one in it?” Katie asked.

“Not that I can see. Doesn’t seem all that likely that someone would be having a snooze while—”

“Shit!”

Bruce twisted around. He didn’t have to ask.

Another Arrival was coming at them. A turquoise one. Just as the silver Arrival had done, it had crossed over into their lane.

“What am I going to do?”

Bruce’s head swiveled. The silver Arrival in pursuit was no more than two car lengths behind them. The one heading toward them was no more than ten seconds away.

“You can do this,” Bruce said calmly.

“Do what?”

“Wait until the last possible second.”

Without looking at him, she nodded. She got it.

The turquoise Arrival was five seconds away.