Killer Santas

Chapter 7

Elaina woke up the next morning, wrapped in a red quilt. She yawned, blinking, as she sat up in bed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

It took her a moment to realize that she wasn't in her own bed. Eyes widening, Elaina glanced quickly around the room, trying to figure out where she was.

Why am I in a strange place? What happened?

Then it came back to her: the garage shooting, Victor showing up at her home, Tony's wish to kill her, their escape to the safe house. Elaina sighed, willing herself to relax slightly before taking a more measured glance around.

Her gun lay on the nightstand, right where she had left it. Unwrapping herself from the quilt, she slid her legs out of bed and stretched. Victor had lent her an old T-shirt to wear to bed instead of her work clothes, which she had been very grateful for. Her shirt and skirt were not meant to be slept in.

Changing rapidly back into her work clothes, Elaina straightened the quilt on the bed and padded into the living room. Victor was still asleep, stretched out on the couch with a green blanket covering him. His pistol rested on the ground near his head, cushioned in between his shoes.

Elaina smiled down at him, silently thankful. If it wasn't for him, I'd be dead, she thought. Because of Victor, I'm alive right now.

Turning, Elaina headed into the kitchen, intent on showing her appreciation. Let's see what I can scrounge up for breakfast.

It didn't take her long to familiarize herself with the kitchen. Soon, she had coffee brewing in the coffee maker, bread browning in the toaster, and was scrambling eggs on the stove.

Victor sat up on the couch, reaching down for his gun. "What's going on?" he called, furrowing his brow. Then he saw Elaina and relaxed, setting his gun back down again. "What are you doing?"

"Making breakfast," Elaina replied, giving him a smile as he stood, tossing the blanket back onto the couch. "It's the least I can do, after you saved my life."

Victor walked into the kitchen, glancing at the pot of scrambled eggs and the toast that had just shot up in the machine. "Man, this looks good," he commented. "Thank you."

Elaina smiled up at him. "You're welcome."

After Elaina scraped the eggs onto two plates, Victor buttering the pieces of toast, she poured the coffee and they headed over to the small table to eat. The food tasted really good, despite Elaina not normally being too fond of scrambled eggs. She put it down to her close scrape with death the night before. I suppose that makes you look at everything a little differently, even scrambled eggs.

"So what's the plan?" Elaina asked as they finished up eating, lifting her coffee mug to her lips. Victor swallowed his last bite of egg and toast and thought for a moment.

"I'm going to head out, see what I can hear," he said. "I want to see how successful my father and Tony's plan was, how many of my employees are dead. We'll figure out how to proceed from there."

"Getting out of the Mafia is going to be hard, isn't it?" Elaina queried, the thought hitting her that she was caught up in all this now, too. Going back to her normal life was no longer an option.

Victor nodded. "Extremely. Don't worry, I've got an idea. But first I got to see what's been going on." He took a gulp of his coffee. "You stay here. I don't want you in any more danger."

Elaina's eyes widened. "You mean stay here by myself?"

"Yeah," Victor affirmed. "But don't worry, nobody knows I have this apartment. No one will come looking for you. Besides, you still have your gun. You can still defend yourself."