Run: 2026-07-25-01KYCPTNH72CY62YZQZQ3BGBNP

The van smelled of pickled onions and regret. Bill had eaten a family-size jar during the stakeout, which he insisted was for "hydration." "Right," Molly said, unrolling a napkin across the dashboard. On it, in biro, she had sketched what appeared to be a lopsided rectangle with a smaller lopsided rectangle inside it. "That's the house." "Which bit's the house?" "The big one." "And the small one?" "That's also the house. That's the inside of the house." Bill leaned in, chewing. "Why's the inside a different shape?" "Because I drew it on a napkin in a moving vehicle, Bill, not because the laws of geometry take Saturdays off." She tapped the napkin. "Party starts at two. Fourteen children, one bouncy castle, one entertainer named Mister Wobbleton." "Clown?" "Magician. Semi-professional. Two-star reviews." "That's the man to watch, then." Bill nodded gravely. "Magicians notice things. Occupational hazard." "He does balloon animals and once made a woman's cardigan disappear at a christening. Nobody's watching Mister Wobbleton." Molly produced a second napkin. This one had a list. "Presents go on the side table by the patio doors. Every party, same spot. It's tradition, like arguing about the sandwiches." She traced a line with her thumbnail. "We come through the garden gate at twenty past three, when the sugar's peaked and every adult in that building has abandoned all hope. Nobody's got eyes. Nobody's got a soul. You could drive a combine harvester through that kitchen and they'd only complain about the noise." "And me?" "You're the balloon man." Bill stopped chewing. "The what." "There's an inflatable pirate ship in the garden. Twelve foot. Somebody has to be inflating it, and somebody has to be seen inflating it, because a bloke doing manual labour at a children's party is invisible. It's science." "I've got a bad back." "You've got a bad everything. You'll be sat on a pump like a man being punished by God, and every parent who passes will think, poor sod, and look away." She folded the napkin. "That's cover. That's beautiful cover. I've been in this game nineteen years and I've never had cover that pure." "And you're doing the actual thieving." "I'm doing the actual thieving." "Why do I always get the pump?" "Because last time I gave you the delicate bit, you told a woman you were a health inspector while holding a birthday cake." "I was improvising." "You were eating it." Bill sighed and screwed the lid back onto the onions. "How much are we talking? Realistically." "Fourteen kids, average spend twenty quid, plus the grandparents, who always overdo it out of guilt." Molly's eyes went soft and dreamy. "There'll be a scooter. There's always a scooter." "You want the scooter." "I want the scooter." "You're forty-three." "I want the scooter, Bill." He looked out at the house, where a man was wrestling a folding table through a doorway with the desperation of the recently divorced. "Twenty past three," Bill said. "Twenty past three." "And if it goes wrong?" Molly started the engine. "Then we're two adults running down a residential street carrying a scooter. Nobody's going to believe it happened."