Till Murder Do Us Part Read online

  Robert watches, with confusion and concern, as his son completes this odd maneuver. He again has the fatherly urge to yell out to David, this time to ask what he’s doing, to make sure everything’s all right. Instead he applies his brakes, loops around, and follows.

  As the haze of sand and smoke starts to dissipate, Robert sees that David has brought his ATV to a stop beside the ravine. His son is sitting motionless, staring at something. His head is cocked slightly to one side.

  Robert slows his sputtering vehicle and pulls up a few yards away from his son, whose body and ATV are blocking Robert’s view of whatever it is David is gawking at.

  “Hey!” he cries. “David, you okay, pal? What happened?”

  David slowly turns to face his father. His radiant smile has been replaced by a heartbreaking look of fear, shock, and bewilderment.

  His voice shaky, David answers, “I…I saw it when we were riding by. I had to stop.”

  “Saw what? What is it?”

  “Bones. Like the ones in my science textbook. Are they…real?”

  Robert chuckles. He dismounts his ATV and walks over.

  “Aw, squirt, bones are nothing to be afraid of. It’s totally natural. Snakes, jackrabbits, coyotes—all kinds of animals live in the desert. And sometimes—”

  “No, Dad,” David interrupts. “Look.”

  Robert is finally close enough to see.

  “Oh, my God!” he gasps.

  He covers his mouth. He staggers backward.

  There, lying faceup in the sand, is a perfectly preserved human skeleton.

  Its limbs are extended, its knees and elbows bent at unnatural angles.

  Its mouth, missing most of the upper front teeth, is wide open, as if frozen in an eternal scream of terror.

  To a non–medically trained eye like Robert’s, it’s impossible to tell how long the skeleton has been lying out here. At what age the person died, or how. Even whether it’s a man or a woman.

  Stumbling backward to his ATV, overwhelmed by the awful sight, Robert knows only one thing for certain.

  “We gotta get back to town,” he says, “and call the police!”

  Chapter 1

  1986, five years earlier

  Kickflip to fakie. Backslide hurricane. Anchor grind to noseblunt stall. Then end it with a sick ollie 360.

  “Yo, Gator, you fall asleep or something?”

  Mark Rogowski opens his emerald-green eyes and smirks. He wasn’t sleeping at all. He was thinking. Planning. Visualizing.

  But turning to his friends Christian Hosoi and Tony Hawk, two fellow lanky skater boys standing at the edge of a massive outdoor half-pipe course, he jokes, “Yeah. I was dreaming, too. About your mom.”

  As his pals crack up, Mark hops onto his board, tilts it over the ledge, and plunges down the steep, semicircular ramp.

  In a flash, he’s zooming up the opposite side, his long auburn locks fluttering. At the top of the ramp, he goes airborne, twirling his board beneath his feet like a tornado before landing on the concrete again with a loud slap.

  Mark shoots right back down the ramp and up another side. He catches more air now, going nearly horizontal, and flips his board around in a wild blur.

  Back down and up the ramp he goes. This time when he’s at the top, Mark slides his board a few feet along the ledge, balancing on it as if he were surfing a concrete wave. Then he slows to a stop and hovers, precariously, over the edge for a few tense seconds, seemingly defying the laws of gravity.

  Now comes his big finish. Mark careens back down and up the half-pipe a final time, crouching low to maximize his speed. When he reaches the upper ledge, he soars to his highest height yet. He effortlessly spins not just his skateboard but his entire body around in midair, twice, before sticking a perfect landing.

  Mark again rides gracefully back up the opposite ramp. He steps casually onto the same ledge he started from and tops off his performance with a faux-modest bow.

  Tony, nodding with respect, gives him a congratulatory jab on the arm.

  Christian claps his hands with vigor. “Dude, Gator, that run was sick!”

  But Mark can barely hear him over the roar of the adoring crowd.

  Gathered all around the perimeter of this sunny beachside skate park in Del Mar, California, is a mass of teenage fans, boys and girls screaming their adolescent heads off. Hundreds of them. Maybe thousands. Which, for a sleepy coastal suburb just outside San Diego with barely five thousand residents, is a pretty big deal.

  That’s because Mark “Gator” Rogowski is a pretty big deal, too.

  He’s a whiz at this new style of skateboarding known as vert (short for vertical), marked by dazzling, death-defying tricks performed on half-pipes, in empty swimming pools, and at custom-designed skate parks. Vert got its start right here in SoCal. But this new extreme sport—as well as its edgy, antiestablishment counterculture—is fast becoming the coolest, most popular thing on the planet.

  And tall, trim, model-handsome Mark is one of vert’s undisputed young superstars.

  Along with Tony, Christian, and a few other homegrown skaters, Mark has built a massive young following. They’re pushing skateboarding to new heights. Literally.

  Not to mention the fact that they’re cashing in. Many are teens themselves yet have started signing lucrative endorsement deals with clothing companies and equipment manufacturers. The more they grow their fan base, the more they earn.

  Mark turns to the crowd, soaking in the adulation. Loving every drop of it.

  “Ga-tor! Ga-tor! Ga-tor! Ga-tor!” they start to chant.

  As his legally trademarked nickname reverberates through the air, Mark lifts his skateboard triumphantly over his head. GATOR is emblazoned in chunky white lettering across his signature psychedelic-patterned decal board design.

  Christian nudges Mark with his elbow. “Check out that bunch of betties,” he says. “I think they’re into you, man.”

  He gestures to a cluster of teen girls standing nearby, smiling and waving. They’re all wearing cutoff jean shorts and string bikini tops and calling out, “Hi, Gator! Gator, over here! We love you, Gator!”

  “Of course they are,” Mark scoffs with deliberate, exaggerated bluster. “I’m young. I’m gorgeous. I’m famous. And I’m loaded.” Mark waves and blows the girls a kiss. They giggle and blow some back.

  Tony rolls his eyes. “Not like it’s gone to your head or anything.”

  But Mark just shrugs him off, and makes a mental note to go talk to those women as soon as he’s done skating.

  Then he steps onto his board again, angles it over the edge, and hurtles back down the ramp.

  Chapter 2

  Spring 1987

  You’re not taking me here to kill me…right?”

  “Very funny. Just tell me which way to turn, okay?”

  In the passenger seat, Brandi McClain, a lithe, seventeen-year-old blond beauty, turns on the dome light and scrutinizes the giant paper map she’s unfurled across her lap.

  “I think it’s a left up at that stop sign,” Brandi says. “But are you sure you got the address right, Jess? This neighborhood gives me the creeps.”

  Brandi’s best friend, Jessica Bergsten—also a slim, striking, seventeen-year-old blonde; she could practically pass for Brandi’s sister—is behind the wheel of her parents’ station wagon. The two girls have been driving for the past ninety minutes, having set out from their homes in a wealthy enclave of Tucson, Arizona, for what Jessica heard from an old friend would be a wild skateboarding party outside Phoenix.

  But right now they’re cruising through a dark, grim, eerily empty industrial part of the city. Nothing but broken streetlights and abandoned buildings scrawled with graffiti.

  “This is the address Christian gave me,” Jess answers. “It’ll be fine. Just relax.”

  Brandi tries to distract herself by flipping down the vanity mirror and checking her hair and makeup. She gives her heavily hair-sprayed bangs a quick tease. She reapplies he
r hot-pink lipstick, the same shade she saw twenty-one-year-old model Cindy Crawford wearing in a recent TV commercial.

  A police siren echoes ominously in the distance as Jessica turns left at the stop sign, just as Brandi instructed.

  And there it is. At the end of the block stands a massive, multistory warehouse. Rows of high-end cars are parked in front. The sound of punk music rattles from inside.

  “Told ya!” Jessica exclaims with a sassy little shimmy. She pulls over to the curb and parks. “Now come on, let’s go meet some cute skater boys!”

  As the two step into the monstrously cavernous space, Brandi’s eyes turn to saucers.

  She’s attended plenty of high school house parties in her day, but nothing that comes close to this. There are flashing, neon-colored lights. A smoke machine. An actual DJ spinning records. A professional bartender pouring cocktails.

  And in the center of the warehouse sits a half-pipe that looks cobbled together from pieces of old wood and scrap metal. Skateboarders are clattering up and down the makeshift ramp, catching air and doing all kinds of crazy tricks.

  “Jess! You made it!”

  A young man with long, flowing black hair rushes up and embraces Jessica, briefly lifting her off her feet.

  “Are you kidding? We wouldn’t miss it! Christian, this is Brandi.”

  “Whoa, I didn’t know you had a twin!”

  Jessica shakes her head. “Please. I wish I were as hot as her. We’re just friends, but we get that all the time.”

  “Nice to finally meet you,” Brandi says. “Jess said you guys are in town from San Diego for some kind of work event?”

  From nowhere, a second skateboarder literally rolls right into their conversation. He abruptly hops off his board and throws an arm around Christian’s shoulders.

  “Did somebody say work? What the heck is that?”

  Christian shakes the man off with a flat smile. “He’s not kidding.”

  The mystery skater ignores his friend and focuses instead on Brandi. “I’m Mark,” he says. “All my friends call me Gator. But you can call me…anytime you want.”

  He thrusts his hand at Brandi—who has been left momentarily speechless. She’s captivated by this young man’s good looks, megawatt smile, and buckets of confidence.

  “I’m…uh…I’m Brandi.”

  “I’m more of a beer and whiskey guy myself, but I can work with that.”

  Brandi giggles at the joke. Smitten.

  Christian says, “This is Jessica. She’s a friend of mine from Tucson.”

  “No way! It’s really cool you guys came out tonight,” Mark says. “Too bad you missed our skating demo this afternoon. Can I grab you ladies some drinks?”

  “I can come with you,” Brandi volunteers, just a touch too eagerly.

  Mark nods at the offer, pleased. “Right this way.”

  As they make their way across the crowded party floor, Brandi asks, “So you guys, like, skate for a living?”

  “You got it backward. I live to skate. Hopped on my first board when I was seven, haven’t stepped off since. All this other stuff? The money, the travel? It’s just the cherry on top, you know? Tell me: how long have you been a fan of vert?”

  Brandi scrunches her forehead. “A fan of…what?”

  Mark laughs. “Ah, I get it. You’re more into the scene than the sport. The cool clothes. The crazy parties. The whole…stick-it-to-the-man part. Am I right?”

  “I guess,” Brandi answers with a shrug. But Mark nailed it. Brandi barely knows the difference between a skateboard trick and a card trick. It’s the edgy, rebellious allure of skater culture—and skater boys—that appeals to something deep inside her.

  “Are you still in high school?” Mark asks as they sidle up to the bartending station. “Senior?” Brandi nods. “What do you want to do after you graduate?”

  “I want to be a model,” she says softly. “That’s my dream.”

  “No shit! You’re hot enough for it, that’s for sure.” Brandi blushes. Mark continues, “Modeling is super fun. I’ve just started doing some print work myself. Mostly for Vision Street Wear. Heard of them? They’re coming out with a whole new line of Gator-branded clothes named after me.”

  Brandi hesitates. She can’t tell if Mark is joking, trying to impress her, or both. “Come on. You seriously have your own clothing line?”

  Mark smiles, mysteriously. “Maybe you can…take them off me sometime.”

  Brandi fully intended to flirt and get some drinks with Mark and then return to Jessica and Christian. But more and more, she’s feeling as though she’d rather spend the rest of the night just talking and laughing and connecting with this cute, unpredictable boy.

  His charm, his swagger, his charisma, his boldness—he’s like no one she’s ever met before in her life.

  Brandi finds Mark unbelievably attractive.

  And just a little dangerous.

  Chapter 3

  Dating a hunky, world-famous skateboarder sure makes it tough to focus on algebra homework.

  In the nearly six weeks since Brandi McClain and Mark Rogowski met, she’s found it nearly impossible to focus on, well, just about anything besides her dreamy new boyfriend.

  Brandi still replays in her mind, again and again, their magical first encounter. She can still feel the tingle of their intense chemistry. Can still smell Mark’s enticing musk. Can still recite lines from their wide-ranging conversation, which stretched late into the night and ended with a steamy make-out session at sunrise.

  Since then, geographic distance has mostly kept the two young lovers apart. But they’ve been managing to make their relationship work.

  With Brandi living at her parents’ home in Tucson and Mark based in San Diego, the pair has kept in touch via phone calls and handwritten letters. By the side of her bed, Brandi keeps a three-ring binder in which she’s placed every note Mark has ever mailed to her, each one longer and more emotive than the last, filled with affection and passion and his dreams for their shared future. Discovering that Mark is such a talented wordsmith has been one of the biggest surprises about dating him.

  Another surprise is just how wildly successful a pro skateboarder he really is.

  The massive fan base. The multiple endorsement deals. Brandi still can’t believe the level of fame and fortune twenty-one-year-old Mark has achieved simply by doing tricks in empty swimming pools! She had no idea it was even possible. Mark’s career is already very impressive, and as far as she can tell, it’s only getting started.

  Brandi is halfway through a mind-numbing algebraic problem set when the old rotary phone in her bedroom rings. She leaps up from her desk, shouts “I got it!” to her parents downstairs, and snatches up the handset.

  She hears his silky baritone: “Good evening, you sexy thing.”

  “Mark, stop,” Brandi whispers—but secretly, she loves it.

  “Whatcha doing? And whatcha wearing?”

  Brandi looks down at her open math textbook and then at her ratty T-shirt and grubby sweatpants. Instead of telling the truth, she answers with a titillating tease.

  “Oh, nothing much. And…nothing much.”

  Mark says something in response—but it’s drowned out by static.

  “Mark? Hello? Are you still there?”

  “Sorry, can you hear me now? Maybe we have, like, a bad connection. I’m calling long-distance from Florida.”

  Did Brandi hear that right? Easing onto her bed, she asks, “Did you say Florida?”

  “Yup. We landed this morning! I could’ve sworn I told you I was coming here in one of my letters, didn’t I?”

  Brandi doesn’t answer. If Mark did mention it, it seems unlikely she’d forget. “Well, anyway, yeah, Bill booked us all for some two-day skate exhibition in Miami. It’s amazing down here, babe! The beaches, the booze, the gorgeous w—”

  Mark’s voice suddenly cuts out again. But this time, there’s no static. Brandi is left to wonder if it’s the bad connection…or Mark
biting his own tongue.

  It sure sounded as though he was about to say gorgeous women.

  She feels her chest tighten at the thought.

  Brandi may be only seventeen, but she’s not naive. She’s well aware that Mark’s a young, rich, handsome guy surrounded by fawning, beautiful, half-naked girls everywhere he goes. To Brandi, this makes Mark’s apparent devotion to her and their relationship that much more special—and their separation that much harder.

  “Mark? I lost you again. What was that last part?”

  “Sorry, I was saying the beaches, the booze, and the gorgeous weather down here are all incredible! I wish you were here with me to enjoy it!”

  Brandi smiles with relief. “Me, too.”

  Then Brandi hears some muffled voices on the other end.

  “Babe?” Mark says. “I gotta go. We’re all grabbing dinner, then going to some press event. Catch ya later!”

  “Okay, have fun, miss you, bye!”

  Brandi hangs up the phone and leans back against her pillows.

  With Mark top of mind, it’s going to be extra hard to focus on her math homework now.

  But Brandi also knows their situation is temporary. She’s in her final semester of high school. And as soon as she graduates, she can move out to California to pursue her dreams of modeling and being with Mark.

  Brandi sighs and clutches the binder of letters to her heart—which fully and forever belongs to Gator.

  Chapter 4

  Mark Rogowski lifts his chin. He swivels his hips. He tugs up the hem of the tie-dyed T-shirt he’s wearing—a large Vision Street Wear logo is on the front—until it exposes his six-pack abs. He looks directly into the camera. He levels a smoldering gaze.

  Bulbs flash. Shutters click.

  “Great stuff, Gator! Really hot! Keep it up!”

  Mark strikes a few more bad-boy poses as a photographer snaps a flurry of pictures.

  Once Mark hears “That’s a wrap!” he strides off the indoor set and makes a beeline for the catering table. He’s stuffing some sweaty slices of American cheese and a stack of stale Oreos into his mouth when he feels a tap on his shoulder.