The little café kiosk near the entrance. Nothing. By the time he hit the east path, he was no longer pretending this was normal. He was nearly running. The path curved along the tree line toward the boundary gate, half-shadowed by old rain trees and lined with benches no one used unless the rest of the park was full.
Jack scanned ahead as he moved — the path, the shrubs, the stretch of open ground beyond the fence. Nothing. His mind was doing things he didn’t want it to do. Not yet. Not this fast. Eli was thirteen. He wasn’t a toddler.