Molly pressed her face against the chain-link fence, watching the suburban backyard transform into a pastel nightmare of streamers and balloon arches. A bouncy castle inflated slowly in the corner like a rising soufflé of poor decisions. Bill crouched beside her, sketching a crude map on a napkin he'd stolen from a Wendy's. His handwriting looked like a seismograph during an earthquake, but he insisted it was tactical shorthand. The presents sat on a folding table near the back porch, stacked in a glittering pyramid of gift wrap and curly ribbon. Molly counted at least thirty boxes, some practically vibrating with the promise of electronics inside. "We go in during musical chairs," she whispered. "Why musical chairs?" "Maximum chaos. Nobody watches anything during musical chairs." Bill nodded slowly, absorbing the genius of this observation. He'd once tried to rob a pet store and left with nothing but a parrot that kept reciting his license plate number. He trusted Molly's planning instincts far more than his own. She pulled two tiny party hats from her jacket and handed him one. The elastic string barely fit under his enormous chin. They would blend in perfectly, she thought, with absolute and unjustified confidence.