There Is No Devil Sinners Duet Book 2 By Sophie Lark-pdfread

enforce his narrative that I was talentless, that he was the real artist. He
started marking me lower, and even criticizing me to other professors. Telling
them I was lazy, that my ideas were unoriginal. Protecting himself, in case I
ever decided to pipe up. He didn’t know I had already torn up the sketch.”
Mara rests her hand on my thigh, understanding two things at once: first, the
pain of being slandered to the people you most want to impress. And second,
the fucking rage when that slander is based off a lie, the exact reversal of the
truth.
“It ate at me, day after day. This man stole from me, and he wouldn’t even
acknowledge it. He was punishing ME for it.
“I began to notice all the other things about Professor Oswald that were
loathsome. As his ego swelled, he became more and more arrogant in class.
More inappropriate to Valerie. More careless of which days he was supposed
to lecture. More boastful about his own work.
“I began to feel there was only one way to right the scales. I could hardly
sleep or eat. The itch to remove him from existence became physical. It made
my heart race every time we were in class together.”
Mara lets out a soft sigh, understanding what I’m about to tell her: the real
crossing of the line.
“I had killed twice before. When I killed Ruben, I thought it would be the
only time. I knew what he was, and I knew that even if I handed him every
dollar of my father’s estate, he’d still cut my throat in the night because I’d
once annoyed him. I had to do it—it was him or me.
“The mugger in Paris happened all in instant, in a burst of rage that left the
man’s brains dashed on the wall before I’d even realized the other two had
run. He scared me, that was the problem. My fear overwhelmed my selfcontrol,
and I acted without planning.
“Now I was contemplating something very different: a murder I would plan
ahead of time and execute without real need. The damage had already been
done, or most of it anyway. Oswald was slandering me, still impeding my
career. But this was as much about revenge as protecting my future interests.”
I pause, truly pondering on my state of mind at the time.