Shattered by Mari Mancusi Read Free Book Online Page B

risk yet again because they had no place else to go. Her lousy tips could only get them a night or two in a crappy motel.
    But if they had real money…If they had millions …
    “I’m serious,” Rebekah affirmed. “My dad knows this viral video agent guy. His whole job is, like, to get people paid for their cool videos. And let’s face it, it doesn’t get much cooler than this.”
    Scarlet stared at the screen as the video looped, her stomach now swimming with nausea. She watched as the dragon spread its wings, pushing hard against the ground with all four paws then shooting up into the sky.
    Promise me, Scarlet. Promise me you’ll look after Mom.
    Ten million, six hundred thousand, six hundred and twelve views…
    I will, Mac. I promise I will.
    “Okay,” she said. “Tell your parents you want to go to the game on Friday. We’ll go find us a dragon.”

PART 2:
SPLINTER

Chapter Six
    Strata-A—Year 188 Post-Scorch
    “Hey, Mom, I’m home!”
    Fifteen-year-old Connor stepped inside the limestone cave apartment, coughing to clear his lungs as the mechanical door slid shut behind him, sealing the unit off from the smog-choked tunnels outside. Even the nicest neighborhoods these days were having issues with clean air, despite the Council’s best efforts.
    He waved a hand as he kicked off his boots, trying to dissipate any lingering smoke into the apartment’s ventilation unit. His mother was constantly working to keep the place dirt free—a nearly impossible task when you lived a quarter mile underground. But she never complained. To even have an apartment at all—never mind a real two-bedroom with four walls and a true door—in this day and age was, to most, an unattainable dream.
    “Connor! You’re home!”
    He looked up to see his mother come out from the bedroom, wearing a thin floral housedress, her hair tied up in a kerchief. She looked frailer than he’d remembered. As if she’d lost weight. And her skin was so pale it was nearly translucent. When she threw her arms around him in a hug, he was half-afraid he’d break her like a china doll.
    “How was it?” she asked, her watery eyes gleaming with excitement. “Did you slay a dragon this time?”
    “Better,” he pronounced with as much bravado as he could muster, leading her over to the plastic sofa and sitting her down beside him. “We found an entire clutch of eggs, way up at the top of the mountain. We had to use these things—these bouncers—to get us up the steep parts. The other team had lured the mother away with their Hunter songs, leaving the eggs totally unprotected. We gathered them all up and blasted them with our gun-blades.” He mimicked locking and loading his weapon. “Adios, dragon spawn! Die, die, die!” he crowed.
    And then they had screamed. Horrible, blood-curdling screams as the babies boiled alive in their eggs.
    But no one wanted to hear that part.
    His mother laughed, as he knew she would, rubbing his head with her hand, like she used to when he was little. “My son the Dragon Hunter,” she pronounced, looking at him with affection. “If only your dad could see you now.”
    Connor winced at the mention of his father. His death had been the reason he had enrolled in the Academy and become a Dragon Hunter in the first place. It was his opportunity to avenge his father’s death and destroy the creatures that had destroyed his world.
    Turned out he was good at it too, having inherited his father’s gift to sing the dragons close before gutting them with his gun-blade. They called him a natural, and he had risen high and fast. They called him a hero. He even had fan pages on the transweb, designed by giggly girls from the very best stratas.
    He grimaced. If only they knew what a dirty, nasty job it really was. Not half as glamorous as people made it out to be. They saw him as a celebrity. When in reality he was nothing more than a glorified exterminator.
    But he was doing what he had to, to keep his father’s