Grace Fisher & Zack “Hot Legs” Hoolihan join us again this week for one final chat before their story, KNOCK ME FOR A LOOP, comes out.

But rather than write up something special—since they seem to have a bit of trouble with compromise —they asked me to post some snippets from past “Chicks with Sticks” books that sum up the rise & fall of their relationship.

To that end, I give you The Good…The Bad…& The Ugly.

THE GOOD
(from Tangled Up in Love)

Then there was Grace Fisher, Cleveland’s hometown cross between Oprah Winfrey and Martha Stewart. She had her own cable talk show that covered everything from gripping emotional family dramas to making a cake in the shape of a porcupine. She’d even been nicknamed “Amazing Grace” because of her versatility and lack of any apparent faults whatsoever.

Grace was currently engaged to Dylan’s friend, Zack, who played goalie for Cleveland’s professional hockey team, the Rockets. The two had met at a charity hockey event where Zack first hit a puck over the protective plexiglass shield straight into Grace’s skull. Then after she’d been bandaged and examined by the team’s physician, Zack had proceeded to fly off the ice and knock her flat on her rear.

What could have been touted as the most embarrassing moment of Zack’s career had instead become his and Grace’s answer to the question of how they first met. Dylan himself had heard the story going on about six thousand times now.

THE BAD
(from Loves Me, Loves Me Knot)

Grace reapplied her lip gloss–the clear, wild cherry flavor Zack liked so much–and ran her fingers through her hair to boost the light blond curls. Then, pasting on her most seductive Marilyn Monroe pout, she tapped on Zack’s hotel room door.

It took longer than she would have expected for him to answer, so she tapped again. She heard a couple of muffled noises and a muttered curse in response, and had to bite back a laugh.

If she knew Zack–and she did–the room was probably a disaster area already, after his being there only one night, and he was probably tripping over his own shoes, pants, shirts, suitcase, and everything else in an attempt to answer her repeated knocking.

When he finally opened the door, however, she was startled not by his messy living habits, but by how incredible he looked half-naked, still dripping from the shower, with only a modest, white towel clutched around his hips.

Oh, yes, there was a reason she’d fallen in love with this man.

More than one, she supposed, but at the moment it was his incredible physique that stood foremost in her mind.

He blinked and ran his fingers through his wet hair.

“Hey,” he said somewhat distractedly, obviously struggling to make sense of her sudden appearance. “What are you doing here?”

“What do you think I’m doing here?” she replied, her grin widening as she took a step into the room and sidled up to him. She pressed herself against his tall, solid frame, uncaring of his dampness soaking into her clothes. “I came to rock your world, big boy.”

At that, his lips curled and a devilish light brightened his blue eyes. “Well, okay, then. Come on in. Don’t mind the mess,” he said, shifting them both so the door could swing closed.

“I never do,” she replied with a chuckle.

What he’d done to the hotel room was nothing compared to the state of his apartment back in Cleveland. If he didn’t have Magda, his housekeeper, to come in a couple times a week and clean up, Grace swore the place would be declared uninhabitable. And she put up with that, didn’t she?

All right, so she tended to pick up his socks and wipe down a few surfaces any time she was over, but otherwise she thought she tolerated his Pigpen lifestyle fairly well.

Pulling away slightly, she leaned back against the wall running between the bathroom and the rest of the suite. She raked him from head to toe with a hot gaze, using two manicured nails to tug at the towel he was still holding low on his hips.

“I think I’m overdressed,” she murmured saucily.

His lashes fluttered as he returned the head-to-toe scrutiny, causing her nipples to pucker beneath her bra and a warm longing to gather between her legs.

“I should say so,” he replied in a low, suggestive tone. “You need any help remedying that fact?”

“Oh, I think I can handle it,” she teased.

Slipping away from the wall, she continued to face him as she walked backwards into the main area of the room. Step by slow step, while her fingers worked to free the buttons running down the front of her blouse.

Her heel caught on something and she glanced down to find herself standing in one of the leg holes of a pair of discarded BVDs.

“Nice,” she said, shaking her foot and kicking the briefs aside.

As she lifted her head, something in her peripheral vision caught her attention. A movement, a flash of pink.

Focusing her gaze, she turned her head the rest of the way and zeroed in on a woman sitting in the center of the king size bed, back against the headboard, naked except for a matching lollipop pink bra and panty set.

Grace blinked. The blond–bleach blond with dark roots, not professionally salon blond in keeping up with her natural hair color the way Grace did–shifted nervously, dragging the sheet up to cover what Grace had already had the misfortune to see.

Turning her attention back to Zack, she speared him with look that should have shriveled his testicles and had him running like a girl.

“Is there something you’d like to tell me?” she asked, her previously sultry tone replaced with icicles sharp enough to kill.

Zack’s pale brows knit. “Huh?”

Oh, he was good. He had the dumb jock routine down pat.

She cocked her head to the right, indicating the bimbo still snuggled up in his bed. Zack followed her the movement with his eyes, and darned if he didn’t go a few shades paler.

Finding herself suddenly the center of his full attention, the woman climbed to her knees and let the sheet drop. “Hi,” she said with a too-sweet smile. “I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“What the hell are you doing here?” Zack snapped.

Grace knew he was addressing the woman in his bed, but she was the first to answer. “You know, I was just asking myself the same question.”

Fingers flying, she rebuttoned her blouse, then charged for the door, pushing past Zack before he had a chance to stop her.

THE UGLY
(also from Loves Me, Loves Me Knot)

“You.”

That one syllable was spoken so low and with so much venom, she was surprised she didn’t die of odium poisoning right there on the spot. As it was, her skin did tingle and her pulse did kick up a beat.

Of course, that could have just as easily been attributed to the matching fury rolling through her own soul.

Slowly and very carefully, she set aside what she was doing and turned in her chair to smile pleasantly up at a red-faced Zackary Hoolihan. He towered over her, chest heaving. He looked angry enough to spit nails, and she was frankly surprised steam didn’t pour out of his ears.

Dylan stood on his left, just behind Ronnie’s chair, looking distinctly uncomfortable. Gage stood on his right, looking . . . well, like Gage. Sort of big, intimidating, and expressionless. Between them, Zack put her in mind of Yosemite Sam, hopping around and blustering like a crazy person.

It wasn’t easy, but she managed to bite back the grin that threatened to spread across her face.

“Are you addressing moi?” she asked in a voice so sweet, it nearly blew out her pancreas.

“Damn right, I’m addressing you, Little Miss Smart-Ass,” Zack snapped. “You killed my car.”

“Excuse me?” Her eyes went wide in practiced innocence.

“You. Killed. My. Car.” He enunciated each word, spitting them through gritted teeth before resting both hands on the back of her chair and leaning in until they were nearly nose to nose. “You destroyed my Hummer.”

“Your Hummer?” she asked in a voice she was pretty sure Shirley Temple had used in every one of her adorable little movies. “Did something happen to that big red beast?”

Zack stood back once again, but a vein had begun to throb at his temple and she thought he might be at serious risk of popping an embolism.

Good. It would serve him right, the jerk.

“You know goddamn well something happened to it. You happened to it. You broke into the parking garage at my apartment complex not two hours ago and destroyed my fucking Hummer!”

Grace placed one long index finger against her cheek, wishing now that she’d made a point of stopping at the salon before tonight’s meeting. A beautifully manicured nail would be just the thing to show Zack that she was doing fine with out him. That she didn’t care how many silicone-boobed puck bunnies he boffed.

Batting her lashes and pulling her mouth into a sympathetic pucker, she used her best Betty Boop impression to say, “But I thought you said it was indestructible.”

If possible, Zack’s face mottled an even darker shade of red. His eyes were so round, they were practically solid white with only pinpricks of blue at the pupils, and he looked ready to explode.

And that, my Darlings, is about the best refresher you’re going to get aside from holding KNOCK ME FOR A LOOP in your hot little hands.

Grace & Zack have also agreed to answer any pressing questions you might have for them.  Nothing that will spoil the book, mind you, but anything else you might like to know before jumping into their story.

So let the inquisition begin!