The Savage Murder of Skylar Neese: The Truth Behind the Headlines Read Free Page B

whatever was happening between the three of them. Bad feelings were poison to her, as she wrote in her English class and her diary.
    As Shelia, Rachel, and Skylar headed away from Star City, past the Sheetz and across the four-lane bridge over the Monongahela River, Skylar tried not to notice how closely they were following the U-Haul truck. She preferred to look out the side window and ponder their friendship problems.
    The night had cooled down to the mid-seventies, and the high, clear sky full of stars belied the violence of the storm that had hit less than a week earlier. Just over the bridge, the devastation from the recent derecho became obvious. The area was heavily forested and hadn’t been cleared of toppled trees, broken branches, and general debris left behind by the eighty-mile-an-hour winds.
    Skylar had only agreed to join them because she believed they were going to ride around for a while, chat, and get high. Since Rachel was leaving for church camp in a couple of days, there had been some talk of going to a party later. But a mile south of her father’s house in Brave, Pennsylvania, Shelia pulled the little Toyota off to the side of the road and parked. Skylar thought they were going to smoke a joint and decide what other fun they could have that night. She didn’t suspect that her two best friends had something much darker in mind.
    Undoubtedly, neither Shelia nor Rachel mentioned the real reason they invited her to join them on that midnight drive. Nor did they say a word about the shovel, bleach, paper towels, or Handi-Wipes stashed in the trunk of the car.
    Skylar never knew about any of that, so she never got the chance to restore harmony. Instead, on the count of three, Shelia and Rachel pulled out the knives they’d hidden under their clothes and savagely attacked Skylar, stabbing her again and again and again. When they finally stopped, Skylar’s “best friends” stood beside her until she stopped breathing. They watched her die. The murder, cleanup, and burial under rocks, dirt, and fallen branches took more than four hours.
    ***
    Almost a year later, Rachel Shoaf confessed, turned State’s evidence, and pled guilty to second-degree murder in the death of Skylar Neese. Shelia Eddy insisted for almost nine months that she was innocent. But on January 24, Shelia, too, pled guilty—to first-degree murder. She was sentenced to life in prison.
    People who have followed the tragic story know that Shelia’s last-minute plea came about because Rachel confessed. They may not know that before Rachel confessed, she had an emotional breakdown and was committed to Chestnut Ridge Center, a psychiatric hospital. Some people also know bits and pieces of the puzzle: the rumored lesbian affair between Shelia and Rachel, the growing discord between Skylar and her two friends, and the fact that Shelia and Rachel planned the murder as much as a year in advance.
    But few people know that Rachel’s descent into despair began the night she stabbed Skylar to death. Or that she later talked to God in the pages of her diary. Rachel wrote that only He knew what had happened the night of July 6—and it was going to stay that way. Appearances were of the utmost importance to Rachel, who treated the entire UHS student body and the community of Morgantown, West Virginia, to the performance of her lifetime, to keep anyone from finding out the truth.
    For six tumultuous months, no one did. A budding actress and singer with no small amount of talent, Rachel convinced all her friends that she was innocent. That she had had nothing to do with Skylar’s disappearance.
    Unfortunately for Rachel, the only person she couldn’t convince was herself.

Chapter 2
Breakdown
    “You ruined my life!” Rachel screamed at her parents in their driveway on December 28, 2012. “You ruined my life!”
    Rusty and Patricia urged her to calm down. But to Rachel, what was happening was a disaster of epic proportions. Her father was moving back