“Call Killian Desmond. He’ll tell you.”
“I’m sorry, sir. But I was told in no uncertain terms that you weren’t to be let in.”
“Not by Killian Desmond.” Damn Gus!
The doubt that crossed the guard’s face didn’t extend to making him budge. “Sorry, sir.” He reached to his radio.
Mike backed away, climbed into his Bronco, and drove to the parking garage next to the coliseum. Risky, yes, but he had to see his lover, wake up from this nightmare.
Fans lined up, though the concert wouldn’t start for two hours.
“Hey! It’s him! Mike Rose!” someone called out.
More voices joined the first. “Mike! Mike! Over here! Can I get a selfie?”
So many cell phones and none he’d be willing to put Killy’s personal number in. Ink pens appeared, and tickets, pieces of paper, forearms. Tits. Mike inched forward, signing his way through the crowd, not always where the fan offered.
Screaming. Grinning. Pushing.
Someone grabbed his arm. “Mike! Mike! I love you, Mike!”
A hand on his shoulder spun him around. A man lifted his shirt. “Sign my chest.”
“Sign my book!”
“Sign my arm!”
“Sign my cell phone case!”
In a dizzying rush, Mike ping-ponged from one screaming fan to another. Hands grabbed at his guitar case. He clutched it to his chest. Their chants were a deafening roar.
Where could he go? No matter where he looked, people.
Pressing in. So tight. Way too tight. Hands, groping, grasping. So many—he twisted away before his shirt came off over his head. “Gimme some air, guys!”
Someone got a lock of hair—“Ow!”
How long before the next one yanked out a souvenir?
Dear God, he couldn’t breathe! Faces, swimming into blobs. Flashes, a hundred cell phones recording deer in the headlights up close.
Fuck, this mob was gonna love him to death. “I don’t get in there, you don’t get music!”
Didn’t budge them. Or maybe it didn’t budge the hundred others pushing from behind.
“I gotta get in there, all y’all!” didn’t open a path. The woman in his face made duck lips. He’d have nightmares about that. If he survived. More hands, touching whatever they could reach.
Shit, if he could punch whoever’s hand was on his ass, he’d show them what turning the other cheek meant real time.
Killy. He had to get to Killy.
He dropped the pen. It didn’t fall—they were pressed too close. What the fuck? Bodies shoved against his, more aggressive fans pushing the timid or small out of the way.
Mike stumbled and nearly fell. There! The doors. So close. Yet so far. But would getting there help?
Had these guards been alerted to keep him out too? One way to find out. Head down, he held his guitar case like a battering ram in front of him. “Excuse me.” The crowd didn’t part. “Excuse me!” he tried again, the case an icebreaker in this glacier of humanity. “Move it, folks, or Killy won’t play!”
Dear Lord, let that be true.
