Read Online My Blood Approves by Amanda Hocking - Free Book Online Page A

beautiful
cathedral, and we could just see the top of it, arched out into the
sky above the trees. “Mae wanted to get married there.”
    “ What?” I asked, confused
by his sudden topic change.
    “ My brother’s wife.” He
nodded at the church. “But Ezra didn’t want to.”
    “ Why not?” It was a
stunning piece of architecture, so I understood the urge to marry
there. I personally wouldn’t want to, but most of the time, I
wasn’t even sure if I wanted to get married.
    “ They’re not Catholic, for
one thing.” There was more to the story, but Jack seemed hesitant
to tell me about it. Finally, he continued, “It just didn’t seem
right. It was Mae’s second marriage. So they found something else,
and it worked out better anyway.”
    “ How long have they been
married?”
    “ I’m not really sure,” he
shrugged.
    Pulling my hoodie tighter around me, I
shivered. Jack glanced over at me, and he didn’t seem even slightly
bothered by the cold. Nothing really seemed to bother him, except
my bedtime.
    “ Do you want my
sweatshirt?” He started pulling on his sleeve, like he was going to
take it off, but I held up my hand to stop him.
    “ No, I’m okay.” Since he
had actually bothered to put on something warmer today, I wasn’t
about to take it from him because I thought my jacket was
ugly.
    “ Are you sure?”
    “ Yeah, I’m fine,” I
insisted. Flipping up the hood over my head, I smiled up at him.
“See? Fine.”
    “ If you say so.” Jack
pulled on his sleeve, adjusting it back to normal. “Let me know if
you change your mind.”
    “ I won’t.”
    “ I know,” Jack said,
sounding a little exasperated. “You never change your mind about
anything.”
    “ You haven’t known me for
that long,” I scoffed. “How can you be so sure?”
    “ I’m just very certain of
things,” he replied simply.
    That was true enough. He didn’t always have
an answer for everything, but the things he knew, he really knew. I
was about to ask him what the deal was with his sixth sense about
everything, but then his head shot up sharply.
    “ Watch out.”
    “ Watch out for what?” I
tried to keep my voice even, but the instant he got nervous, I was
terrified.
    He stepped in front of me to shield from me
something, but I peered around him, looking into the dark for some
lurking danger.

    - 6 -
    At first, I thought it was a giant grizzly
bear barreling towards us. Then it ran underneath a lamp on the
path, and I saw it was just a massive brown dog. There was a dog
park on the other side of the park, so I wouldn’t have thought
anything of it if Jack hadn’t been on such high alert.
    “ It’s just a dog,” I told
him, hoping that would somehow relax him.
    “ I know what it is.” He
seemed to be debating something, probably whether he should run or
stay put, but the dog was approaching quickly, making his decision
for him. “Ah, hell.”
    The dog snarled at us, but it never even
slowed down. Drool and slobber spewed from its mouth, and its eyes
had a crazed, intense look I had never seen on an animal
before.
    Without any provocation, it suddenly lunged
at Jack. He held one arm behind him, trying to protect me more from
the dog, and he held his other arm in front of him, using his
forearm to block the attack.
    The dog latched on it with a loud crunching
sound that made my blood curdle, and I screamed. With one swift
movement, Jack whipped his hand around, grabbing the dog by the
back of the neck.
    “ Go back to the car!” Jack
shouted.
    He had pinned the dog to the ground by
kneeling on its back and wrapping his hands around its neck. There
was blood streaming down his arm, and all the while, the dog was
snapping and growling viciously.
    But I stayed frozen, gaping at Jack and the
dog.
    “ Alice! Go back to the
car!”
    “ Why?” I felt nauseous, but
I didn’t want to leave Jack. If I did, I knew that something bad
would happen, although I didn’t even know what that
meant.
    “ Alice! Just do