“You probably don’t remember. But I was there first. The Followers needed someone who could get to Goodson when the whole thing started to fall apart. We couldn’t have him talking in an interrogation room. And his blood wasn’t wasted. I made sure of that. It all went to the Good Man.”

Carl smiles now. Carrie can only see the corner of his face, but he’s smiling. And he seems to lean forward without moving. Like a thinner, sleeker version of himself is emerging from his pudgy features.

“If you’re so smart, Carl, why didn’t you stop Hailey from sending us those invitations?” Carrie sounds truly pissed off for the first time. “Why didn’t you keep us from coming back?”

Carl laughs out loud. “Oh God. Why do you think? We wanted you back here. We knew what Hailey was doing. We knew she’d never agree to this, no matter what she said. We knew Danny and Eric would come running, because they had no lives. But you were trickier. So we had that woman killed and left you a clue, and you fell for it like you always did. We sent monsters after Alana, and that got her pissed off enough to come looking for payback. None of you could resist the chance to play hero again. We set up this whole thing. And you walked right into it.”

“Makes sense,” Carrie says. She doesn’t sound angry. “You need us for the sacrifice. That was the plan all along.”

“Oh, don’t act like you knew the whole time,” he says, sounding disgusted. “God, I always hated that. You’d always act like you knew everything, even when you nearly got killed. Like you were so damn smart. Admit it, Carrie. You didn’t see any of this coming.”

For a second, there’s no sound but the rain and the hiss of the tires on the wet asphalt.

Carl looks at her in the mirror again and smirks.

She meets his eyes and stares at him without blinking.

His smirk fades. He looks back at the road and swerves, almost hitting a teenager walking like a zombie on the rain-slick road.

“Easy there, Carl,” Carrie says. “You’re supposed to bring me to the sacrifice. Let’s make sure we both get there alive.”

The buses arrive right behind the police car. Eric watches his former classmates, Alana among them, walk out, slowly, herded by Followers carrying shotguns.

Buzz pulls up in his BMW and parks. He hops out and begins waving around a big, fuck-off semiauto pistol. There is lots of shouting and bullying and threats. Eric thinks Buzz has finally found his calling.