Chapter 372: Mr. Wallace’s Testimony

Chapter 372: Chapter 372: Mr. Wallace’s Testimony

Hearing Mr. Wallace was finally willing to talk, Evan Keller and Heath Hale sat up straight. Their faces remained impassive as they listened to him continue.

"I was the first college student to make it out of my village. Only after I left did I realize how much more prosperous the outside world was than I’d ever imagined." As Mr. Wallace spoke, his eyes lit up, as if he were seeing something incredible.

In fact, everything he encountered after starting college was shattering his worldview moment by moment.

He watched as the wealthy effortlessly obtained things he could never get, no matter how hard he tried. They didn’t even have to ask; everything just fell into their laps.

Gradually, Mr. Wallace’s psyche began to twist. He hated the rich, yet he yearned to become one of them.

’Marry an only daughter, change my social class.’

Once this idea took root in Mr. Wallace’s mind, it never left.

He felt he was quite competitive. He had the looks, the height, and the education.

Marrying into a family was no problem for him; he wasn’t concerned about his children carrying on his wife’s family name.

No matter how he looked at it, Mr. Wallace felt he had a much better shot than many of the other men who had clawed their way up from poverty.

And he didn’t just think about it; he took action.

Mr. Wallace quickly identified a target. Things went smoothly at first, but just as he was on the verge of success, his parents suddenly showed up from his hometown with a girl.

She was known in his village as the simple-minded girl. A fever in her childhood hadn’t been treated in time, leaving her with brain damage.

The girl’s parents doted on her and had always taken good care of her. Mr. Wallace’s family was poor, so to afford his education, he and his parents went to the girl’s family and promised that he would marry her as soon as he graduated.

The girl’s parents thought Mr. Wallace’s parents were decent people and figured the son they raised couldn’t be too bad either.

Thinking they could secure a future for their daughter, no longer worrying about her after they died, and keep her close to home where they could visit anytime, they readily agreed to the marriage and lent Mr. Wallace the money for his studies.

This time, Mr. Wallace’s parents had brought the simple-minded girl over, hoping the two could foster some affection for each other.

When the girl he had been pursuing saw Mr. Wallace and his family, she realized she’d been deceived. She cut off all contact decisively and even rescinded the job offer she had arranged for him.

Having failed to gain any benefit, let alone marry into money, Mr. Wallace was furious.

But he couldn’t take his anger out on his parents, so he smiled and promised to treat the simple-minded girl well. The moment his elders left, he took her to his rented apartment and tormented her to vent his frustrations.

At first, Mr. Wallace didn’t dare go too far. He only harmed her in places covered by clothing. During video calls with his parents, the bruises wouldn’t be noticed as long as she didn’t get too close to the camera.

Gradually, the video calls from his hometown became less frequent, and the conversations grew shorter.

After asking his parents, Mr. Wallace learned that the simple-minded girl’s brother had gotten married and had a child. The old couple was busy taking care of their son’s new family and paid little attention to their daughter.

They took it for granted that Mr. Wallace would take good care of their daughter. After all, their family had lent him so much money.

And so, Mr. Wallace’s abuse began to escalate.

To be even more secretive, after graduating, he specifically moved with the girl to a city where no one knew them. He rented an apartment and locked her inside.

Whenever something at work went wrong, he would come home and take it out on her with his fists and feet.

The various injustices he’d witnessed in college, combined with the twisted sense of satisfaction he got from beating the girl, warped him further. Mr. Wallace was no longer satisfied with his current situation.

He began selecting suitable targets among his students, slowly putting his ideas into practice.

Until a few days ago, after being berated by a student’s parent, Mr. Wallace went home and couldn’t control his strength. He beat the girl to death, only then realizing with a jolt that something was terribly wrong.

But there was no turning back. After a moment of panic, Mr. Wallace calmed down and began to think about where in the residential complex he could hide the body.

’The trash bins are out of the question; she’ll definitely be found. Dumping the body far away isn’t realistic either.’

After thinking it over, Mr. Wallace decided to hide the body somewhere nearby within the complex.

To destroy evidence, Mr. Wallace took full precautions. He washed the girl’s body thoroughly to make sure none of his own traces remained on her.

Then, Mr. Wallace waited for a day when the complex had a power outage. In the dead of night, he hid the body in the utility room of the building furthest from his own.

Everything was going according to Mr. Wallace’s plan. But he never expected that his supposedly foolproof actions had been witnessed by Aaron Nash, who then used it to blackmail him for hush money.

Mr. Wallace knew he was no saint, and Aaron Nash was stealing electrical wires.

So he decided to take advantage of the situation and kill him. Even if the body was discovered, it would most likely be ruled an accident.

"And that’s what happened. If Aaron Nash hadn’t come to you beforehand, I absolutely would have gotten away with it!" A hint of indignation flashed in Mr. Wallace’s eyes.

’Everything was perfect, but then this one variable had to pop up and make all my plans go down the drain!’

’I just needed to hold on for about another month! I could have finished handing off my work and left this place!’

’Then no one would have been able to contact me! None of this would have had anything to do with me!’

"Officers, I’ve told you everything. I’ve confessed to what needed to be confessed. So... can I get some leniency?" Mr. Wallace looked at Evan Keller and Heath Hale with hopeful eyes.

’I’ve said everything I was supposed to say, and I’ve cooperated with the investigation. Doesn’t that mean I can be charged with involuntary manslaughter, like we discussed at the beginning?’

Evan Keller and Heath Hale closed their notebooks and looked at the man before them with stern faces. "The final sentence will be up to the court. As for your testimony, we will investigate it for any inconsistencies."

Then, as Mr. Wallace began to frantically pound on the table, the two of them left the interrogation room.

Outside the interrogation room, Captain Young was already waiting with his team.

Seeing them come out, Captain Young nodded at the two. "We found her. Because she wasn’t preserved in any way, the body is severely decomposed after all this time. The moment we went in, the stench was so strong it made our eyes water.

"But we can still see from the surface that the deceased suffered numerous beatings before her death. For more specific details, we’ll have to wait for the coroner’s autopsy report."

Evan Keller handed Captain Young the written confession from Mr. Wallace.

Their objective for this trip had been achieved. The follow-up would be handled by the local police department.

"You’ve worked hard. I admit I questioned your abilities at first, but now, I’m convinced."