Mary Jane's Grave (14 page)

An hour after I was supposed to leave, I called Eric to check on the girls and talk to them. After that, I drove around for two hours. I was trying to figure out how I was going to tell Michael. I decided since there was no easy way to do it, it was time to go home. My stomach was in knots.

I saw Michael looking out the window when I pulled into the driveway. I realized this would probably be the last time I would ever see him do that and suppressed the urge to cry again. I closed my eyes and put my head against the wheel. I didn’t think I would be able to go through with this. I had to keep telling myself it was for Michael and Sean. I was doing the right thing.

I put on my best game face and walked toward the house. He opened the door before I had a chance to turn the knob.

“Honey, where have you been? I’ve been calling.” He reached over to hug me, but I pulled away.

I walked to the kitchen table, set my bag and keys down, took off my jacket and hung it in the closet. Michael stood by the door, looking at me with apprehension.

“Did you have a bad day? We can talk about it,” he offered tenderly.

My chest felt like it was going to explode, and I was trying hard to not let him see me trembling and breathing hard. I was on the verge of panic. Looking over at a picture of Sean on the wall, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply.

“Michael, I do need to talk to you, but not about my day. Let’s go sit in the living room,” I said stiffly, without emotion.

His expression showed grave concern. I could see him trying to read my face for signs of what I wanted to discuss. Since Michael could usually read me like a book, I had to be very careful. He sat down, still looking directly at me.

I cleared my throat. “There’s something I’ve wanted to talk to you about, and now seems as good a time as any, considering the mess with Vanessa.”

I could see he was holding his breath.

I did my best to maintain eye contact with him. If I looked away, even for a slight second, he would know I was lying. I knew that what I was about to say would shatter his world, and it was killing me.

“Michael, this is very hard for me to tell you, but you need to know the truth.” My heart was pounding so hard I was sure he could see it through my shirt. “Last night when I told you I was closing files out in the store room, I lied—I was really with Eric.”

He looked devastated, but I had to keep talking or I wouldn’t be able to finish.

“We were talking and we…we decided to put the divorce on hold and give our marriage another try.”

Michael stood, and I saw his eyes begin to water. “Please tell me that again. I don’t think I quite understood what you just said.”

I looked at him. “What I’m trying to tell you, Michael, is that I still love Eric, and I can’t marry you. It’s not fair to you.” I made a grave mistake and briefly looked away when I said I still loved Eric. I couldn’t help it. Michael caught it immediately.

“You’re lying.” His eyes, still watering, were dead on mine.

“No, I’m not. Michael, don’t try to look for reasons to make you believe this isn’t happening, because it is.” I felt the tears coming and I stood, turning my back to him until I could make them go away.

He turned me around. “I know what you’re doing, and it’s not going to work.” He got right in my face. “You think that there’s a chance I’m going back to Vanessa, and you’re playing it safe by getting back with Eric, right? Well, it’s not going to happen!”

I backed away from him, feeling the bile rise in my throat. I honestly thought I was going to be sick. “What are you going to do to stop it, Michael? Huh? Nothing! That’s what! You think I want to deal with your psychotic ex- wife for the rest of my life?” I laughed. “Hardly. Nobody, including you, is worth that grief!” I was getting hateful, but he’d never believe me if I didn’t.

He stood staring at me, looking as if someone had just run him over with a truck, tears now streaming down his cheeks.

“Please, Cee. This isn’t you. Something’s going on…Please, talk to me,” he begged, and took a few steps towards me.

I backed away. “Michael,” I lowered my voice. “The only thing going on is that I’m still in love with my husband, the father of my children. Maybe this will help you believe what I’m telling you: Eric and I slept together last night. That’s why I was late. I really didn’t want to have to tell you that.” I paused to let the words sink in. “It’s over, Michael. I’m sorry.” I held my head up defiantly and placed my engagement ring on the table in front of me.

Something changed in Michael’s face. It went from pure devastation to sheer hatefulness. I have never been hit by a man I was in a relationship with, but I genuinely thought to night might be the first time. Not that I wouldn’t be completely shocked if Michael laid a hand on me. He was too good for that.

The tears were gone from his eyes, but he continued to look at me with utter contempt. Remaining silent, he turned to leave the room, then turned back and faced me again.

His voice was low and scratchy. “You are the worst mistake I have ever made in my life. I gave you everything, and you have just shit all over me. I will always regret the day I met you, CeeCee.” He was breathing heavy. “So help me God, I never, and I mean never, want to see your face again. I hope you’re happy. I’ll be gone within the hour.”

His words hit me like daggers before he left the room, sending shock waves rippling through my body. The emotions I had been holding in were violently fighting their way to the surface like a raging volcano. I grabbed my car keys and ran out the door, shaking so uncontrollably I could hardly get my keys in the ignition. I knew I had to quickly find a place to park because I wouldn’t be able to drive.

I was a block away when I pulled into the parking lot of a pair of tennis courts. I jumped out of my car and began running, to where I don’t know, when my volcano finally erupted. I fell to my knees. I was sobbing, my chest was heaving, I was soaked with sweat, and I was screaming. Even when I found out Eric had been having an affair and we finally decided to divorce, I had never felt pain like this. It was excruciating physical pain.

I thought of Michael, the way he felt, the way he smelled and how much I truly loved him, and my pain worsened. I honestly thought I was dying.

Dear God in heaven, please make this go away!
my head screamed. It didn’t go away. I continued to cry until I actually started vomiting. I remember once, during the Murder Mountain case, Eric said he was leaving me because I was going to West Virginia with Michael to find the killers. I was upset then, certainly, but nothing like this.

It was when I had a vision of my daughters that I began to calm down. They needed me, and they didn’t need me a basket case. I had to pull it together, not for myself, but for them. I also knew that very soon Michael would be seeing Sean, and that’s what was most important.

I was still on all fours in the gravel parking lot when I began taking long, deep breaths to try to calm down. I finally made my way back to my car, but I didn’t think I was quite ready to drive yet. My eyes felt like they were the size of baseballs. My head, tingling and achy, felt like a hot- air balloon, and my stomach was still queasy. I also had a loud ringing in my ears that didn’t seem to be going away.

It was forty- five minutes before I felt able to go home. When I drove down my street and saw my house, dark and uninhabited, I felt the earlier emotions begin to come back. Doing my best to fight them off, I pulled into the driveway and went into my empty house.

Michael had left a note for me on the kitchen table:

CeeCee,

I will make arrangements in the next couple of weeks to pick up the rest of my things. I would appreciate it if you were not here when I do. I would’ve liked to have seen Isabelle and Selina be fore I left, but now it doesn’t seem possible. Please tell them I will call soon. Not that you gave him much thought, but Sean will be extremely upset by this. I would prefer that you do not call him. I will take care of it. Michael

Oh, the irony. If he only knew how much thought I had given Sean. I had given him more thought than my own daughters. After reading Michael’s note, I wondered how I would explain to them why Michael left. They would both be very upset, Isabelle more so.

I went upstairs and saw that Michael had taken most of his clothes from the closet and all his toiletries. I sat on the closet floor, looking at the empty hangers and began crying again. I ended falling asleep in my closet and not waking up until an hour before I was supposed to leave for work.

When I opened my eyes I was hit with everything again, and realized I wouldn’t make it through the day. I left a message on Naomi’s voice mail, telling her I wouldn’t be in because I wasn’t feeling well. I knew she’d be suspicious, but I didn’t care. I crawled into bed and slept on and off most of the day, with bouts of crying in between. It was not only crying and sadness I had to deal with, it was also anger.

I had more violent thoughts of what I would like to do to Vanessa Hagerman than I ever had about anyone in my life. It would be downright scary if I were to see her right now. I also went over and over ways to get myself out of this, almost coming up with a realistic solution but not one good enough. I thought if I filed a formal complaint with the Cuyahoga County Bar Association against the judge and Vanessa’s attorney, that it would do the trick. Then I realized that it would be her word against mine. I should’ve been smarter and taped our conversation, just as I assumed she was doing with me. However, now that Michael had left, I would only look like a bitter ex- girlfriend. It was hopeless.

I called in sick the next two days. My answering machine was flooded with calls from Naomi and Coop. I think one of them even stopped by the house because I heard knocking, but I didn’t answer the door. By the end of the second day, I was at least able to function, meaning I could get out of bed. I had convinced myself that there was nothing I could do, and that I needed to get on with my life. Still feeling like I had a cement block in my chest and a lump in my throat, I talked myself into going to work. On my way in, I stopped at my attorney’s office and signed my divorce papers, telling him to call Eric to do the same. He said they would be filed by the end of the day. I wanted closure on everything.

Naomi and Coop, knowing I hadn’t called in sick that day, were waiting in my office. They jumped all over me the minute I walked in, wanting to know if I was okay, what was wrong, why didn’t I answer the phone or the door, telling me how worried they were, and that they almost had someone break in to check on me. It was what Naomi said last that got an emotional reaction from me.

“When I called Michael, all he would tell me was you weren’t feeling yourself.”

I was stunned. “You called Michael?”

Coop and Naomi exchanged confused glances. I realized I was giving myself away, and I needed to fix it quickly. I wasn’t ready to tell everyone yet what had happened. I needed some time.

“It’s just that…you really shouldn’t bother him, Naomi. I just had the flu, that’s all. I was asleep most of the time and didn’t hear the door or phone.”

“Okay.” Naomi looked at me peculiarly. “If you want to take it easy today, I can get some other detectives to help you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I have a lot of catching up to do, and I’m more than capable.” I sat down at my desk and started grabbing files and throwing papers.

I wasn’t paying attention when Coop left my office and shut the door. Only when Naomi took a file out of my hand and laid it on my desk did I notice. She pulled a chair over to me and sat down.

“CeeCee, I know you’re telling me you had the flu, but in all honesty, I don’t believe you.” She looked at me solemnly. “I’ve never seen you like this before. I hope you know you can talk to me.”

I tried to smile. “Really, Naomi, you’re making too much of this, I’m…”

I lost it. I suppose I was trying too hard to put on a show and my emotions got the best of me. I became hysterical there in my office, putting my face in my hands and sobbing. No one has ever seen me do that before.

Naomi was speechless. Only briefly. “CeeCee! Oh my God! What happened?” She grabbed the box of tissues off my desk and began handing me one after another.

For reasons unknown, I confessed everything to Naomi. Truthfully, it felt good to talk to someone about it. She was even more shocked.

“I can’t believe you, of all people, would let someone bully and blackmail you like that! CeeCee, you have to tell Michael!”

I looked up from under my tissue. “No! Naomi, I just told you, there’s no other way.” I inhaled in short, hic-cupping breaths. “You have to promise me right now that you will not say a word to anyone, especially Michael.”

It took her a few minutes, and I honestly thought she was going to refuse and tell Michael everything. Nevertheless, she finally relented, nodding her head, tears in her own eyes.

“CeeCee, I can’t imagine dealing with this.” Her voice was quiet, soft. “After all you two have been through…this isn’t fair. How are you going to handle this?”

“I don’t know,” I sniffled.

Naomi sat with me for half an hour while I cried, finished and attempted to pull myself together. She kept shaking her head, completely flabbergasted at the situation. I knew how she felt.

I was so tired of being an emotional train wreck, I was desperate for a distraction. I found it when I looked down on my desk and saw my notes from the sheriff’s story on the 1986 murder at Mary Jane’s Grave. Naomi saw me looking at them.

“You find something?”

“No, I just decided I’m going to spend the day looking for this murder file.” I held up the notes.

She stood up to leave.” If you need to talk, call me. Will you be okay?”

I sighed and gave a halfhearted smile. “For now.”

As I promised, I spent the entire day searching for the old murder case. It was a wonderful way to get my mind off my disastrous personal life. And as I predicted, it was like trying to find a needle in a haystack. I started with the boxes we had transferred from the storeroom. Trying to find the ones marked 1986 was a feat in itself.

I didn’t have a report number to go by, so I had to flip through each file, skimming for the location. Since the department averaged about 150,000 calls per year, this would take me weeks. However, since the sheriff told me he remembered the murder occurred in spring, it narrowed my search considerably. I sectioned the boxes off, between March and April of 1986 but had no luck. I made another attempt at February and May but still came up with nothing. It was my call to the cold-case unit that struck gold. I silently scolded myself for not checking with them first.

When I called them, a detective with more than thirty years on the department, Greg Tolander, knew exactly what I was talking about.

“Hell yeah, we got that case, CeeCee. I’m actually surprised you hadn’t called earlier since there was another murder down there. I figured you’d want to see this one.”

“I didn’t even know about it until a couple days ago. You do have everything? Photos, statements and all?”

“Yup.”

“Anywhere near solving it?”

“We already solved it. It was those kids, no doubt about it. But since they were all acquitted, we have to hang on to it. All it does is take up space.”

“I’ll be over shortly to get it.”

I felt a tad euphoric over the revelation of the file’s whereabouts. Not ecstatic by any means—the dark cloud of the Michael situation was still hovering—but it was a welcome feeling nonetheless.

I decided to take the file back to my office. It was the end of the day, and I could’ve gone home, but all I’d do there is sit and stare at walls.

As I got to my desk, my attorney called and said, “Congratulations, you’re officially divorced!” I couldn’t say I felt like celebrating.

I grabbed a cup of strong coffee before I settled in to review the case file. Reading the file, I felt a sense of gloom come over me, and it didn’t have anything to do with Michael. The case itself was depressing.

The victim, sixteen-year-old Melissa Drake, was a somewhat backward girl with very few friends. According to the statements, a popular boy at school who had just broken up with his girlfriend befriended Melissa. The boy, Derek Solis, took a genuine interest in Melissa, and she was thrilled. Along with having a new boyfriend, Melissa was sought out by a new group of friends, popular girls, including Derek’s ex- girlfriend, Meghan Dearth. It was all a ruse.

Living by the old adage, keep your friends close and your enemies closer, Meghan Dearth set forth an intricate plot to kill Melissa Drake. And it appeared she succeeded. For months they took Melissa with them wherever they went: to the mall, to the movies, out to eat and to the best parties in school. Melissa was in seventh heaven, having never known a social life before.

Her heaven turned to hell in March of that year when Meghan and the others—Nicole Harstein, Alexis Kemper, Sydney Whitlow, Dillon Anderson, and Daniel Griffin—decided to show her Mary Jane’s Grave. The children of local attorneys, doctors and judges, they took Melissa there and dared her to kiss the pine tree.

She had just bent over when the first strike came, and then the next and so on. They had beaten Melissa Drake to death with rocks. Meghan Dearth had felt humiliated to have been dumped for a backward, plain and unsociable girl like Melissa Drake, so she got her revenge. Furthermore, she got away with it.

No one talked. The parents provided their alibis and even testified to the fact. According to them, the teens were all at home. Only once did Nicole Harstein tell one of the investigators what really happened. Even so, when the case went to trial, she retracted it all and claimed the detective coerced her. There was so little physical evidence, each of them was found not guilty. According to the detective who interviewed Nicole Harstein, Daniel Griffin did the actual killing. The rest of them handed him the rocks.

I put down the statements and looked at the photographs of the crime scene and body; it was brutal. Melissa’s head had been caved in on both sides. I hoped that she blacked out with the first blow. I shivered, thinking back to when Naomi’s head had been crushed with a rock.

When I finished viewing the photographs, I looked at the background of all the suspects. They were all clean, straight- A students except one, Daniel Griffin. He was a twenty- two-year-old high school dropout with an extensive criminal record. One of his prior charges was a felony conviction of cruelty to animals. He had taped a bottle rocket to the side of a kitten with duct tape and lit it. He served only three months in the county jail for it. There was another conviction of cruelty to animals, but the file didn’t give the circumstances.

My question was why were these other kids hanging around with him, and how did they know him in the first place? He was clearly the odd man out. At the time of the murder, he was living at the YMCA. The parents of the others covered for Daniel as well, knowing if they didn’t and he took the fall, he would talk.

According to Nicole, Meghan kept urging Daniel on and screaming, “Kill the bitch! Do it!” She also claimed that Meghan was giving Daniel sexual favors in return for his part in the murder. Nicole said that she and Meghan were out driving around one night and found Daniel walking down the street in a rough part of town. Allegedly Meghan said, “He looks perfect for the job. Pull over!”

Nicole denied knowing what Meghan was talking about, but she pulled the car over anyway. It seemed as if all the girls were terrified of Meghan. I couldn’t imagine why. Nicole said that Meghan got out and stood outside the car whispering to Daniel for almost fifteen minutes. When he got into the backseat with Meghan, Meghan ordered Nicole to start driving while she gave Daniel a blow job. Meghan’s father was a municipal court judge who retired about five years ago. I’m sure he was quite proud of his daughter’s actions. Knowing cops as I do, I guarantee the detectives told the judge everything. I never liked girls like Meghan Dearth, and I could never understand how other girls followed them.

All the girls were seventeen years old, and all were 165 tried as juveniles, another indication of their parents’ standing in the community. Anybody else would have been bound over as an adult in a heartbeat. When I looked at their pictures, I thought back to the time of the murder. I was just turning thirteen, and I don’t ever remember hearing about this. My father was still a patrolman back then. I’d have thought he would’ve mentioned it. He always came home and told me about cases like that.

I put the photographs down, and wrote a list of things I needed to do. I was very interested in finding out the circumstances behind Daniel Griffin’s other conviction. It was in Richland County in 1984, and luckily I had a report number. I also wanted to track down all of these kids. They didn’t talk then, but maybe they would now. Years of guilt may have taken its toll on some of them—except Meghan Dearth. People like her don’t ever change. But even if they confessed the whole crime now, they could never be tried for it by reason of the double- jeopardy law.

Melissa Drake had been murdered in March, the same month all the Hendrickson women died. I highlighted the date of the murder and threw the file aside, stretching my arms and back. Only now did I realize how late it was. Since I had nothing to go home to, I wanted to stay and finish looking through the file. I only had a little more to go.

The last section of the file was the follow- up after the murders, including the suicide report of Melissa’s mother that had been taken a year later. Someone had made a copy and put it in her daughter’s murder file. It saved me from having to look for it. Melissa’s twin brother, Nicholas, and their father, Martin, survived Melissa and her mother. After Lucinda Drake’s suicide, Martin and Nicholas moved out of state to parts unknown. I couldn’t blame them. I don’t know that I would’ve stayed around here either.

I closed the file and sighed. It was heartbreaking. It made me appreciate that my problems didn’t amount to shit, considering what other people have gone through.

I took my notebook and tried to sum up what I had so far, which was essentially nothing. I had a century-old legend and two murders twenty years apart. Throw in another attack and a skinned dog, and I almost laughed at myself. None of them had anything to do with the others. I knew that, so why was I hell-bent on solving all of them? Because it gave me something to do, and I always held out hope.

Looking at my watch again, I recognized that I would only get a few hours of sleep to night before coming back in to work. I had already accepted that sleep would be minimal for the next year or more, until I got over Michael.

After gathering my things, I walked out to the parking lot. I was somewhat surprised to see Eric and Jordan standing by his cruiser, kissing each other good- bye. Since she was still in uniform, I assumed that she worked overtime for half of the night shift with Eric. We exchanged uncomfortable pleasantries for a few minutes, and I asked about the girls. They were with a babysitter until Jordan got home and were doing fine. I gave a slight wave before heading to my car, which was parked in the back of the parking lot.

Eric and Jordan had left by the time I opened my car door, and as I had that night at the lake, I had the peculiar feeling I was being watched. I scanned the parking lot and didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. There were always cars there twenty- four hours a day. If someone was watching me, I probably wouldn’t know it anyway.

Once inside my car, I turned on my dome light so I could see while I put my bag and purse on the passenger seat. Unexpectedly, I was hit with another emotional attack. I began sobbing, put my face in my hands and lay my head on the steering wheel. I wished I could keep this from happening, but I figured it was something like the flu. My emotions came in waves as they saw fit, and there was nothing I could do about it.

I don’t know if it was seeing Eric and Jordan happy or the prospect of going home to an empty house that triggered my breakdown. It was probably both. Nevertheless, it took me only a few minutes to settle down, unlike the hours it took before. I was making progress.

When I got home, I was moderately amazed all it required was an entire bottle of wine and two hours to fall asleep. Three hours later, I was ready to head back to work.