Run: 2026-09-23-01M36TXJVWE78GKC6YVWRTTW1D

Molly unfolded the garden map across the bonnet and weighted it with a brick. Below, forty children screamed at a bouncy castle. The present table sat under the marquee, a mountain of paper stacked by a six-year-old's aunts. Two minutes, she calculated. In and out. Then she checked the laminated contingencies. "Forty kids. Two adults. No cameras." She tapped the marquee flap. "We go in behind the magician." "Which magician?" Bill bit into a vol-au-vent. "The one with the rabbit. When it comes out, everyone looks. That's our window." "Where did you get that?" "Procurement. Different discipline." Bill licked his thumb. "What's the haul?" "Twenty-three presents. Lego. A scooter. Something enormous in green." "And if someone sees us?" "Confused uncles. Everyone trusts uncles at these things." "I don't look like an uncle." "You're eating like one." He shrugged. "Then we look confused. That's the entire character." "Fine. Rehearse with me. We walk in like we belong, nod at the cake, take the table, and nobody's the wiser." She stared at him. Beneath the wrapping she already knew the last gift would be socks from a grandmother, and the whole haul worthless to anyone but a grown man who needed socks.