Mary Jane's Grave (18 page)

“What was that supposed to mean?” I couldn’t help but ask.

“I think Melissa lived on a farm.”

“Oh.”

“So, basically, after that, Meghan came up with the idea to become friends with Melissa. The initial plan was we were going to make her our friend, make her popular, and then totally embarrass her in front of the entire school later on. Meghan said she was going to get everyone to nominate Melissa for Homecoming Court. There’s always an assembly where members of the court walk down the aisle with an escort to the stage. Meghan, who was also on the court, would be announcing the other nominees. She said when Melissa got to the stage she would announce there was a mistake in the voting and Melissa only got one vote and she would have to leave, humiliating her. After that she would be shunned by everybody.”

I shook my head. I couldn’t help thinking what a bitch Meghan Dearth was.

Nicole sighed. “We all went along with it, but when Homecoming came, Meghan said she’d had a change of heart. The rest of us were actually relieved. Meghan went on as normal for the next several months, acting like Melissa was our friend. I remember one day she told me she genuinely liked Melissa and was over it. Until…until that night she picked up Daniel.” She began to play with her braid. “He was so disgusting. When she told me to pull over and pick him up I thought she had finally lost her mind. She said he was perfect for the job. At the time I didn’t know what she meant by that.”

I interrupted. “But you didn’t ask? Why?”

“Because you didn’t question Meghan, that’s why. Her father was a judge, the teachers loved her, girls wanted to be her. I felt lucky, at the time, that she was my friend. If only people knew how she really was. She could put on such an act…” She scowled at the thought.

“Nicole, how long was this before the murder?”

“Um, I think it was like two or three weeks? I’m not positive. I know that Meghan blew him in the backseat that night and slept with him almost every night after that. I couldn’t stand him. Neither could anyone else, but he was with Meghan so we kept our mouths shut. He was so weird and creepy I tried to keep my distance from him.”

“How was he weird and creepy?”

“The way he acted mostly. He was always quiet and kind of just stared at you. It used to freak me out. When he did talk, it was always dark shit, like death and evil and that kind of crap. One day he was a pagan, then a Wiccan, then a Satanist, then an agnostic, always something different. I remember what he said to me once, though. He said, ‘Death releases your soul.’ I didn’t bother to ask what it meant.”

“All right, Nicole, tell me about the night of the murder.”

Her eyes filled with tears again. “We were drinking, and Meghan was the first one to bring up Mary Jane’s Grave. Melissa seemed really interested. She’d never been there before. That was when Meghan decided, not suggested, that we go down there. She said matter-of-factly, ‘Everybody get in the car. We’re going to Mary Jane’s Grave.’ Meghan drove. Me, Sydney, Alexis, Dillon and Melissa crammed into the backseat. Daniel rode up front with Meghan. They were whispering a lot back and forth during the ride. When we got there, everything seemed fine. We were drinking, laughing and having fun. Meghan seemed in a good mood, which was a rarity.” Her chest heaved up and down as she took another breath. “It was when Meghan dared Melissa to kiss Mary Jane’s tree that the mood changed. I remember Meghan whispered something to Dillon, and he went over and turned the car stereo up as loud as it would go. Some Stevie Nicks song was playing. Sydney and Alexis were smiling at each other and I felt like the odd one out. Melissa, she was drunk, skipped over to the tree. Daniel was helping her. It was too late when I saw Meghan pick up the rock, a broken piece of tombstone, and hand it to Daniel. Just as Melissa leaned over to kiss the tree, he hit her with it—hard.” Nicole started sobbing.

“Take your time, Nicole,” I said.

“I’m o-okay. She went down face- first. I remember I was screaming, and Meghan ran over and slapped me across the face, hard enough that it hurt a lot. She told me to shut the fuck up or I was next. Sydney and Alexis gathered more pieces of the tombstones while Melissa lay there. She was mo- moaning, and blood was running down her head. She was trying to get up when Daniel hit her again!” she wailed. “I felt myself gagging and thought I was going to throw up. Dillon slapped me in the back of the head and said, ‘Don’t puke, dumb ass!’ Daniel kept hitting her, but she kept moving. Her arms and hands were flailing out in front of her, and you could hear her gurgling and panicking. It made me so sick.”

I could only imagine. Just sitting here and listening to the story, I felt a wave of nausea hit my stomach. What a horrible death Melissa Drake had suffered. She was most likely already dead by this point of Nicole’s story. Sometimes it takes the body longer to die than the brain.

I remember once watching a video of an accidental death at a death investigation school. A man into autoerotic masturbation would half hang himself while he masturbated, always videotaping it. Unfortunately, on this particular occasion the knot slipped and he killed himself. Although he was brain dead, his fists clenched up and his arms began to punch the air for almost a minute. It was a physiological reaction to death and one of the most disturbing things I’ve ever seen. Melissa Drake probably had similar activity.

Nicole continued, “Meghan was kicking her too, in the head, the stomach, all over! What I couldn’t believe was that the others were laughing! They all knew!” she said, her eyes wide. “Finally, Daniel picked up a huge piece of tombstone and smashed her with it. She stopped moving after a few seconds,” she cried. “But that wasn’t all. Meghan flipped her over and, oh my God, her face! It was all caved in. You couldn’t recognize her! Meghan snapped a large branch off the pine tree and pulled Melissa’s pants down…” Nicole put her hands over her mouth and shut her eyes.

“Go on, Nicole, you’re almost done,” I said sympathetically.

“She-she put the branch in her, like, you know…and she said ‘Don’t fuck my boyfriend, fuck
this
, bitch!’” Nicole fell apart completely, bending over, grabbing her knees and wailing.

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Ron whispered, shaking his head.

I grabbed a few tissues from my purse and walked over to Nicole. I knelt next to her, rubbed her back and handed her the tissues. As soon as she seemed to com-pose herself, I couldn’t help asking a question.

“Nicole, did you tell all of this to the detective you gave your original statement to? Especially the part about Meghan kicking Melissa?”

If she had, I wanted to know why the hell Meghan Dearth’s shoes weren’t confiscated. They would’ve had blood evidence all over them.

“No, I never told him about the kicking.” She hic-cupped. “But even after she was dead, Meghan kept hitting her with the rocks until Dillon told her to stop.”

“What happened after?”

“Daniel tossed the pieces of tombstone that they had used in a nearby ravine. I was over by the car crying and they waited for Daniel before walking over to me. They had all been standing in a circle, whispering. I thought they were gonna kill me, too! But Meghan was nice. Scary nice. The rest of them just stood there looking at me with smiles on their faces. Meghan said, ‘You know, Nic, things will be different if you ever tell anyone about this. You were here, too! You’re now just as guilty. If anyone asks, we all stayed at my house, never left. You got that? God help you if you talk. What happened to that bitch is nothing like what we’ll do to you.’ What the hell else could I do but agree? They suspected I told that detective something, and they followed me around for weeks. I was terrified! So that’s when I said that stuff in court. After that, they left me alone and, like I said before, I left on graduation day and never went back. I heard that Meghan is some bigwig attorney now. How ironic.”

“Did you know Melissa’s mother killed herself a year after that?”

She bowed her head. “I heard.”

I stood looking at Nicole briefly before flipping through the file in my hand. I could tell from the autopsy report that Nicole was telling the truth. Melissa had been sexually assaulted with a pine tree branch.

“Nicole, do you have any idea what happened to Daniel Griffin after that?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t care, unless he’s burning in hell, that is. Sydney and Alexis are somewhere in California, I heard, and Dillon, I heard he’s now a homeless bum in Florida.” She stood, her eyes red and swollen. “Sergeant, really, I’ve told you everything. That night will haunt me for the rest of my life, and yes, I deserve it, but please, would you please go now?”

I nodded and walked out as she opened the garage door. Ron had remained surprisingly silent during the interview but unloaded as soon as we got into the car.

“Fucking unbelievable. And you’re telling me they got away with that shit? Fucking American justice sys-tem was, is and will always be a joke.”

“Usually, but this time I might be able to use it to my advantage.”

“How’s that?”

“These people were only tried for aggravated murder. I’ve now got them on rape, conspiracy to commit rape and gross abuse of a corpse, not to mention perjury.”

“If you can make that fly, I’ll stand on my head naked in downtown Indianapolis and sing the theme to
COPS
.”

“Be careful, Ron. I’m starting to get a visual. And don’t consider backing out on me when I win.” I smiled, and cringed at the thought.

“You’re over your statute of limitations by six months. Rape is twenty years to the day.” He looked smug.

“We’ll see about that.” I looked even smugger.

He was right, but I had a feeling it was a bluff I could easily pull off if Meghan was as arrogant as I perceived her to be. She was very young when she was prosecuted, so I highly doubted she looked at the autopsy report. She probably thought they had simply missed it, which is why she wasn’t charged.

After Ron dropped me off and I started home, I called Michael immediately. I was going to have to back out on my word. My stay in Indianapolis, although brief, was longer than I had anticipated. It would be dark by the time I got home. He insisted on waiting up for me, and I didn’t argue. I missed him.

After I grabbed a glass of wine and engaged in much needed physical affection with Michael, we sat down while I played the tape of my interview with Nicole Harstein-Judson. As he had during my interview with Walter Morris, Michael stared at the tape recorder, the lines in his face deepening as Nicole began to describe the murder. After the tape ended, Michael was lightly shaking his head.

“You realize that Melissa Drake suffered horribly when she died, don’t you?”

I nodded. I explained to him my intentions regarding the twenty-year-old case. He disagreed completely.

“The state statute of limitations on rape is twenty years. You’re over it by about six or seven months.”

“Doesn’t matter. Section F in the Ohio Revised Code specifically states that as long as the
corpus delicti,
that’s the body of evidence and—”

“I know what it is. I did go to law school, remember?” He smiled.

“Oh, right. Anyway, it says as long as the
corpus delicti
remains undiscovered, the statute of limitations doesn’t begin until it
is
discovered or brought to the attention of law enforcement. That’s how all these priests are getting tried on sex crimes thirty years after the fact.”

“But she’s already been tried and acquitted. Double jeopardy applies.”

“Meghan Dearth was only tried and acquitted for aggravated murder, not rape or gross abuse of a corpse. I can’t imagine why those charges weren’t added, but it seems that the case was fixed and screwed up from the beginning. Anyway, double jeopardy doesn’t apply.” I raised my eyebrows with self-satisfaction.

“Says who? The sexual assault was already included in the autopsy, therefore it
was
brought to the attention of law enforcement. Sorry, baby, you’re kind of screwed on this one. Of course, there’s still the question of why the prosecutors at the time never charged her for that.”

I laughed. “I can never get one by you, can I? Actually, yes, Michael, I’m aware it’s a bullshit no-can-do charge, but I think I can get Meghan to buy it. As for the original prosecutors, I can’t begin to imagine why they didn’t put either charge on the indictment. Either they were on the kids’ parents’ payroll or they were complete dipshits.”

I explained my plan to Michael, and how I was fairly confident Meghan Dearth would take the bait. He wasn’t so confident and shook his head.

Michael leaned forward. “Let me get this straight. You’ve got a murder committed a couple of weeks ago that you think is related to one that happened in 1986…or at least you think one of the suspects from 1986, Daniel Griffin, has something to do with the current one, right?” I nodded. “And in finding this out, you come across new evidence that implicates one of the other suspects in the 1986 murder, rape and gross abuse of a corpse—a bullshit charge, but you think she’s going to buy it anyway and cough up a confession. Does that sum it up?”

“Sí. I’m going to tell her there’s a warrant issued for her arrest on those charges, mainly to watch her squirm.”

“What if she checks into it?” He raised an eyebrow and smirked.

“Then I’m fucked.”

“This is a pretty dangerous game you’re playing here. You’d better be careful.” Michael was smiling broadly now. “And the witch…where does she come in?”

“I haven’t figured that out yet, but don’t think I won’t.”

“That’s my girl.” He gave me a squeeze. “There’s no doubt in my mind that you’ll have this wrapped up by the end of the month.”

Michael and I finished our wine before turning in for the night. I had planned on getting an early start for Cincinnati, so I could get home at a decent hour. Michael changed his mind and offered to reschedule his day so he could go with me, but I regretfully declined. I didn’t need any distractions, which, since he’d been back, Michael had been. In a good way, of course.

I stopped in my office to check through my six- inch stack of business cards. Every time I went to a seminar or dealt with another agency, I kept their cards in case I needed something later from them. I had a slew of detective business cards from Cincinnati PD, but I grabbed one in particular, Detective Simone Vardona.

Simone and I had taught several classes together at the peace officers’ training academy in London, Ohio. Last time I spoke with her, she was working vice, going undercover as a prostitute. Simone was the definition of a firecracker. She was one of those people who could make someone feel as small as a mouse, even while she was smiling. I’d also seen her flip side, and she could have the strongest of men cowering in a corner. She was exactly who I wanted standing next to me when I contacted Meghan Dearth.

When I called Simone and filled her in, she said she was looking forward to “verbally crucifying the little bitch.”

After I checked in with Naomi and grabbed a cup of coffee to go, I was on my way to Cincinnati and to Meghan Dearth.