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closer. “It’s coming down hard. Look at the trees.”
    I looked outside the entrance windows to see the rain slowly dripping from branches already slick and heavy with ice. Through the French doors opening to the back lawn and lake view, I could see a large sculptural bronze fountain—deer again—with icicles already forming on the delicately worked metal antlers.
    â€œThe power lines were starting to droop as we came in,” Will added, though it was clear from his expression that he didn’t want to be the messenger used for target practice.
    â€œLook, we’re going to be fine,” Sadie said. “I’m sure there’s plenty of food in the kitchen, and over there we have what looks like a generously stocked bar. We have provisions, blankets, a roaring fire, and people whose company we enjoy. There’s nothing to worry about.”
    We also had a chandelier overhead that appeared to be composed of deer antlers and white “candle” bulbs. That was something you didn’t see every day. And now I was thinking of a redneck version of Phantom of the Opera , in which the scarred, misunderstood, and bucktoothed country music genius dropped a deer antler chandelier on the jerks who messed up his magnum opus and “done stole his woman.”
    I was not a well-adjusted person.
    I swore I was seeing the chandelier swing ever so slightly when suddenly the lights snapped off and the HVAC system died with a mechanical whine.
    Before my eyes could adjust to the darkness or I could pull out my anti-redneck Phantom pepper spray, I heard Sadie sigh, “Crap.”

3
    In Which We All Fail at Being Happy Campers
    Everybody seemed to start talking at once, but to no one in particular. I heard shuffling footsteps and the unmistakable smack of heads colliding as my esteemed colleagues stumbled around in the dark as if they’d expected those around them, whom they’d just seen a few seconds before, to have magically rearranged themselves when the lights went off. I froze in place, waiting for the chaos to ebb. And then I realized that I’d reached out for the nearest person and had frozen while clutching Charlie’s arms like lifelines.
    In the faded light provided by the lobby windows, I saw the outline of Charlie’s head bending toward me. His hands curved around my elbows, keeping me on my feet. Shadows and my maladjusted night vision kept me from seeing his face, but I doubted he wanted me clinging to him like a lamprey. Just then, one of our ever-so-flappable colleagues blindly smacked into Charlie from behind, driving him into me. Charlie’s arms instinctively curled around me to keep me upright as we collided, and my face ended up buried in his chest.
    By Frodo’s fuzzy feet, did he smell good! Like the herbal tea Bonnie drank, with notes of spice—cardamom or ginger or something like that. It was the same scent that had me drooling into my coffee during Charlie’s very first meeting on staff. All I wanted to do was bury my nose in his shirt and never come up for air.
    There was a soft pressure against the crown of my head, as if Charlie had tucked his chin over my hair. Right. I sighed, resisting the urge to burrow myself in Charlie’s chest and live in that scent. Indulge in more masochistic olfactory torture. That will make things better. I felt Charlie’s hand ghost down my back, settling at the base of my spine, and I relaxed into him.
    Everything was going to be okay. Sure, we were without power, in the middle of nowhere, in unfamiliar surroundings, with the storm of the century closing in on us . . . What was my point again?
    I could hear Sadie telling everyone to calm down and stop responding like a bunch of hysterical farm animals. And when that didn’t work, Bonnie suggested a song to lift our spirits and keep us centered. Her proposed chorus of “Bridge over Troubled Water” didn’t band us together