Sighing, I turned around and nearly started drooling. Kyler stood in the bedroom doorway, shirtless in pajama pants. His stomach… why did his stomach have to look like that? All rippled and hard and stuff…

“Syd?” He stepped out, closing the door behind him. “Are you okay?”

“Aren’t you cold?” I sort of wanted to smack myself after saying that.

He grinned. “I wasn’t until I got out of bed.”

“Good point.” I shifted my weight, feeling like a turd. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“It’s okay.” He sauntered over to me, all hundred-percent male, and I kind of hated him for that. “You can’t sleep?”

I shook my head as I stifled a yawn. “The wind, it sounds like it’s ripping the entire—”

A loud crack interrupted and caused me to jump. From the window at the end of the hall, the sky lit up with a shower of sparks, and then the entire house rumbled for several seconds. Overhead, the hallway light flickered twice, and then went out, plunging the hall into complete darkness.

“Shit,” Kyler said, and I felt his hand on my back. “I think the power just got knocked out. The backup generator should kick on.”

I blinked, trying to get my eyes to adjust, but I could only make out his silhouette. The lights hadn’t come back on, but I could hear something gearing up, like a low-level hum. Air was blowing out of the vents in the hall, nowhere near the power before, and didn’t curb the cold sneaking into the house.

He cursed again. “Stay here.”

“I’m so not moving.”

I heard him walk back toward the window. “Well, triple shit. One of the pines just came down, hitting the power lines.” He turned, aggravated. “The backup will only run in emergency-mode—heat at a minimal, enough to keep pipes from freezing and the fridge—stuff like that.” He was back in front of me again, his breath warm against my forehead. “Go back into the bedroom while I check downstairs and make sure everything’s okay.”

“Okay.” Nervous, I tightened my hold on the blanket. My heart was pounding fast. “Do…do you have to go?”

His hand was on my back again. “I’ll just be a few minutes.”

“Sorry, but all I can think about are those people who were stranded in the snow and had to eat one another.”

Kyler laughed deeply. “Baby, that was like in the eighteen-hundreds or something. We’ll be fine. I’ll be right back.”

“You’re not going to be saying that when I start chewing on your leg like a zombie.” But I put my hand on the wall, using it as a guide to the room while he moved through the darkness like a damn cat.