Several law enforcement agencies, including the Painters Mill PD, the sheriff’s office, and BCI, conducted a search that produced dozens of disks, drives, computers, a laptop and hundreds of photographs. I’ve seen a lot in the nine years I’ve been a cop, but the outrages inflicted upon Mary Plank top all of it.

Because Glenda Patterson alibied Barbereaux, Glock and Pickles brought her to the station for questioning. Handcuffed and surrounded by cops, she spilled her guts. She claimed no knowledge of Barbereaux’s involvement in the murders, going so far as to suggest he drugged her, left the house, and then sneaked back before she regained consciousness the next morning. We’re still trying to decide whether to put her before a grand jury. She wouldn’t be the first woman to lie to protect her lover.

Mary Plank’s journal continues to haunt me. Throughout all of this, I worried I would never be able to prove beyond a shadow of doubt that Barbereaux was the man she wrote about. The man she loved. Just this morning, I learned that the DNA from the sperm found inside Mary’s body was matched to DNA taken from Barbereaux. Evidently, he didn’t know human sperm could live for up to three days.

Since the fetus and placenta were never found, there was no way to extract paternal DNA from the child Mary Plank was carrying, making it impossible to ascertain the identity of the father. But I know in my heart it was Barbereaux’s.

T.J., Pickles and Mona spent two days in the woods surrounding Miller’s Pond before finding the tree where Mary Plank carved her and her lover’s initials. M.P. loves S.B. forever. Next to it, she’d carved a heart pierced with an arrow. While it didn’t mean much in terms of evidence, it meant the world to me on a personal level. I had my proof.

I’ve spent the last couple of days piecing together a theory. I believe Scott Barbereaux delivered gourmet coffees to the shop where Mary worked. He also fancied himself an amateur photographer and did a few wedding and family reunion–type shoots at the store. I believe he met her there, charmed her, pursued her and seduced her. Unaccustomed to that kind of attention from an attractive male, Mary was swept off her feet. In the following weeks, he bought her gifts that seemed lavish to a naïve Amish girl. English clothes. Lingerie. Jewelry. He introduced her to music, sex and drugs. Once her judgment was skewed—either by her feelings for Barbereaux or the drugs—he began drugging her with dangerous barbiturates and sedatives, such as Rohypnol. At that point, he began photographing and videotaping her in pornographic situations, using his friends Todd Long and Jack Warner as actors.