There Is No Devil (Sinners, #2)

by Sophie Lark

I have never been someone of value. Not to anybody. Not even to my own goddamned mother, the one person on this planet who is supposed to give a fuck about me. I’ve had friends, but I was never the most important person in their life, the sun in their solar system. As fucked up as it sounds, the first person who truly took an interest in me … was Cole.

The man who never cared about anyone is fixated on the girl nobody gave a shit about. In some twisted way, we’re made for each other.

“You deserve to be here as much as anyone. More than anyone. You’re talented, Mara, really fucking talented. You’re already a star. Everyone else doesn’t know it yet, but I do. You’re going to make art that makes people think and cry and burn with envy.”

“You threaten everything I thought I knew, and everything I believed.”

“At first it was against my will,” I tell her. “But now I’m all in. I have to have you. Even if it blows up my life.”

She’s out of her fucking mind, and so am I. Our madness aligns in all the right ways.

“It feels like I’ll do anything for you. Jump off a bridge for you, turn myself inside out for you. It feels like madness, and I never want it to end.” Cole considers this, his dark eyes roaming over my face. “Then I must be in love,” he says. “Because that’s what I feel, too.”

“Give me a little credit,” he scoffs. “Whatever else I may be, I was never a man who had to tear a woman down to shine bright beside her. If you’re not as good as me, then you’re no good at all. And when I saw you, Mara … I thought, this girl is really fucking good. I don’t want to hold you down, chop you down, diminish you in any way. I already know I found something special. Now it’s time for everyone else to see it.”

I think to myself that humans don’t learn things all on our own. Someone has to teach us. It might be necessary for someone to believe in us before we can believe in ourselves.

Unloved children are crippled because no one shows them the way.

Nothing can save you. Just like nothing can change you. You are what you are … dead to me.”