The Row(24)

Me: Yep! See you there!

I put down my phone, wondering for a second whether Jordan thinks this is an actual date, before I decide it doesn’t matter.

He’s funny, really cute, and he wants to spend time with me. That’s all I need to know right now.

Time to start my personal research. I take a breath and remind myself that I am doing this for me, for the truth. Popping a piece of licorice in my mouth, I open my laptop and type Daddy’s name into the search engine. The first article that pops up makes my stomach clench: “Perfect Gentleman to Vicious Murderer?”

I take a deep breath and scan through that article first. It talks about his happy home life and successful law practice. Then it poses some theories about what could have turned Daddy into a murderer.



Is it possible that this monster was always inside David Beckett? Could it have been lying dormant until something or someone woke it? At which point, it could’ve become too hard for this killer to go back to the gentleman’s fa?ade again—or maybe he chose not to.

I’ve never heard that one before, but it isn’t exactly groundbreaking.



Could Mr. Beckett have an undiagnosed adult-onset mental illness? Could he be seeing and hearing things that aren’t real? If so, he’s an expert in the art of deception.

I shake my head. These theories could be presented about anyone who’d been accused of murder. Nothing so far is specific to my father’s situation. No clues. This isn’t helping me.



Perhaps the happy home life Mr. Beckett appears to have isn’t everything he would have us believe. Could this be the reason the victims in this case have similar features to the defendant’s wife, Amy Beckett? Could this supposed happy home be more like a nightmare? We already know he had at least one affair. Could he have been that unhappy? Did David Beckett kill these women to fulfill some deep-rooted desire to kill his wife?

Taking a deep swig of my Coke, I sit back in my chair. The affair information was nonsense. I’d known this since the trial. The prosecution had accused Daddy of having an affair with one of the victims, but Daddy had denied it. And when I’d been old enough to understand a little about what it meant and ask, Mama and Mr. Masters backed up Daddy’s story. It was simply a lie meant to tarnish his reputation in the eyes of the jury, nothing more.

The theory about killing the women because he actually wanted to kill Mama is also one I’ve heard before, but that didn’t make it seem any less absurd. The victims were blond and similar in age. Other than that, they weren’t very much like Mama. If Daddy really had wanted to kill Mama, why not just do that instead of killing these other women? It made no sense. I would know if I was living in the nightmare they’d described. And our home life only became messed up after they threw my daddy in prison.

I go back to the original search and read through article after article, but most of it is the same old stuff I already knew. I find a few details I didn’t know about Daddy’s childhood on a site called—of all things—Murderpedia.

It mentions that Daddy’s father, Joseph Beckett, was in and out of prison for the sale and use of recreational drugs. My parents had said Grandpa Beckett was dead and we had never talked about him. This article says he’s alive and living in Florida. I frown, rereading the lines about Grandpa. Why would Mama and Daddy lie about that? And who updates this site anyway? Maybe this information isn’t even correct.

Below this is a single line about Daddy being in a few foster homes when he was young, before his mother cleaned up her drug habit.

I put another licorice in my mouth, sucking on it instead of chewing. Daddy’s father was in and out of jail, and his mother was a drug addict?

I read through the whole page again, wondering if this information is reliable or not. If this article is true, how many other things don’t I know about Daddy’s past?

I glance at the clock in the corner of the laptop screen and am amazed to see it’s already almost six. Maybe I can check out one or two more articles before I have to head out to meet Jordan.

I go back to the search page, scrolling past the other similar articles and looking for something new. My eyes stop on a page that makes my mouth dry out: “Captain Vega Rides Arrest of East End Killer Straight to the Chief’s Office.”

It’s an old article—this happened almost ten years ago. Still, my body trembles with anger as I click the link. I skim through the article and a few sentences stick out, making my blood boil.



It was standing room only as Mayor Yardley introduced the newly appointed chief. As Vega approached the podium, the crowd broke into applause …

Despite a slow start to his career, Nicolas Vega has been a hero in the Houston area ever since the arrest and conviction of David Beckett for the East End Murders two years ago.

The mayor finished the conference with a simple statement: “I feel we can all sleep better knowing that Chief Vega is now guiding our men and women in uniform to protect this city. They will grow by having such a solid representative of justice to lead them.”

I growl to myself. The idea that one man benefited so much from putting my father in prison makes my stomach roll. I scroll through the rest of the article and stop when I see a picture. It’s easy to recognize Chief Vega. He’s the one who came to our house, handcuffed my father, and took him away while my mother cried and held me tight against her. It had been the most terrifying moment of my life.