Pounding through the stage doors, Clay was released into the night cool. A handful of fans were waiting along the paddock fence and they hawkeyed him immediately. “Clay! Clay! Sign something for us!”
Be it obligation or self-indulgence, Clay couldn’t deny them. He accepted the ticket stubs and pens they slid through the chain-link, even a white Chuck Taylor that one guy tossed over. He signed as quickly as he could, while they assured him that they’d be buying all the music Ghost ever recorded ever. They’re going to be as disappointed as I am, Clay reflected.
Then he was around the corner, searching for the gate that would lead him out to the parking lot and the noise and chaos of a Hollywood night. It was deserted back here, the bored-looking guard having quit his post. No roadies, no tour buses. Only BadVan, sitting in the dark on the far side of the paddock. And what had happened to the light? Last time through, Clay was certain there had been illumination to rival daylight.
And the exit gate was bolted shut with a bike chain. And even as his mind ordered his body to climb the fence—haul ass, get out!—BadVan’s headlights snapped on, pinning him. The engine revved and the van screeched and charged. Clay took two steps to his right, meaning to escape back around the building, before a fist struck his skull from behind. Clay was on his knees before he knew he was falling, white, static-cling bursts of light flashing across his vision.
The van was speeding at him, and Clay had time enough to contemplate what its tires would feel like crushing his bones.
Clay Harper. Run down by his own angry band.
Except someone was straddling him and BadVan swung wide, angling itself in a V with a dumpster to block the view of the fans streaming into the parking lot. Wincing, Clay rolled to his back, already knowing it was Fiasco Joe who’d cold-cocked him. The coward can’t even…
The thought died at the sight of Spider towering over him. “Spidey, what—”
The drummer hit him again. Once, twice. Tight fists, hard blows. Right cheek, left eye. Clay writhed, his face already numb. “You ruined it for us,” Spider hissed. “You ruined it, you fuck!”
“Spider, chill,” Fiasco said, hopping from the van.
“No one’s going to listen to us without you now,” Spider told him. And if Clay hadn’t seen the face clearly enough to identify, he wouldn’t have believed the raging, murderous voice belonged to a drummer who’d once gone glassy-eyed over James Blunt’s “You’re Beautiful.” “That’s how you wanted it,” he fumed. “To ruin us! Motherfuck us!”
Spider ripped at Clay’s shirt and Clay knocked his hands away. “You screwed me first!”
He landed an uppercut to Spider’s gut and Spider grunted and dropped back a step.
Fiasco came flying in, leading with his leg in some pseudo martial-arts attack. His knee struck the side of Clay’s neck and his palm crunched Clay’s nose back into his head. The pain was hot, intense, blinding, and Clay rolled and collided with the back wall of the Palladium.
He managed to get a foot under him, but his body only had a single, slow gear; his attackers were on him right away, fingers clutching and scratching, knuckles pounding muscle, glancing off bone. Clay hit Fiasco in the ear and shouted something that might have been help!, but his tongue was bloody and Spider cut him off with a swift kick to the groin. Clay gave a tortured moan; the strength left his legs and, that fast, the fight was over. He was at their mercy.
Spider mounted his torso like a wrestler. “Look at the big star lying here like a little bitch,” he spat. “Too good for money. Too good for us. Now you’re going to bleed, Clay. We’re going to hurt you bad.”
“Quickly,” Fiasco warned him. “Before Savy comes looking. Hold his mouth. I’ll shove my steel toe down his throat.”
Spider yanked a clump of Clay’s hair and pain shot from Clay’s scalp all the way through his neck; the static cling danced in his eyes again. With his other hand, Spider seized Clay’s jaw and forced it open. “Wider,” Fiasco urged. He stepped back, stomped his shiny black boot like a bull primed for the charge.
Clay watched it happen like something out of a dream. Like most, he’d pondered how things would end for him, envisioning all manner of fates—from dying in his sleep at an appropriately old age to falling into a jungle river with piranha. Never had he considered getting beaten to death in the dark by two people who had been his friends. And yet—
“Wider!” Fiasco demanded. Spider cranked Clay’s head harder, until Clay expelled a helpless, pain-choked gasp. They were enjoying this, savoring the moment, and Clay couldn’t even close his eyes against it. As Fiasco raced forward, Clay did everything he could to think of the show, the simple magic of expressing himself in front of thousands. But as the executioner’s ax of Fiasco’s boot arched toward him, all Clay could think of was Savy. Savy looking at him as he sang “Wanting” to her. The emotion in her eyes. Savannah…
Fiasco’s legs lurched sideways and the dumpster gave a flat metal crash and spun askew as Fiasco bashed into it. And then Spider was letting go, and through his half-conscious haze, Clay witnessed a tattooed man,
