"This latest "yarn" provides entertaining humor with just the right amount of romance."
Reviewed by Mandy Burns
Posted January 29, 2010
Romance Contemporary
Grace Fisher is embracing her perfect life with both arms.
She is engaged to the handsome star goalie for the local
hockey team and her talk show, Amazing Grace, is gaining
momentum with every episode. Since her man is on the road a
lot during the season, she indulges herself by trying out
her spontaneous personality, surprising him at his hotel
room. As she drags her pleasantly surprised fiancé to the
king-size bed, she notices it is already occupied. Shocked
by the sight, Grace turns and runs. She is left with a
broken heart and the slobbering dog she stole from him
after she vented her anger in a very destructive way. Yet
to her dismay, Grace is unable to stop herself from helping
him get back on his feet after a possible career-ending
injury. Zack Hoolihan's world swirls to a halt when all his
pleading, begging, flowers, phone calls and whatever else
he can think of fails miserably to assure Grace the
situation she walked in on is not what she thinks. Giving
up is not in his nature, but after six months of trying to
convince her of his innocence, he is out of steam.
Unfortunately, his attitude is showing on the ice. He's
playing like crap because his head is not in the game, and
to show that fate is an evil thing, he is seriously injured
while deflecting pucks. When an opposing player barrels
into him, his body goes one way and his knee another,
leaving him at home on the couch feeling sorry for himself.
That is until his friends intervene and send Grace to play
Nurse Ratchet. KNOCK ME FOR A LOOP is the third book in the Chicks with
Sticks series and proves to have the same entertaining
humor with just the right amount of romance to make you
sigh. A very fun read!
SUMMARY
SHE’S CUTTING HIM LOOSE
When it comes to relationships, talk show host Grace
Fisher won’t stand for cheating—especially not from her
fiancé, star hockey goalie Zack Hoolihan. Her weekly
knitting group backs her up when she calls it off, but it
doesn’t entirely ease the sting of betrayal. She won’t
listen to Zack’s indignant explanations of innocence—she
just wants to tie up loose ends and move on. Until he
winds up injured, that is, and she finds herself playing
nursemaid… NOW HE’S THROWN FOR A LOOP
Zack doesn’t know how that woman got into his hotel room,
but he does know losing Grace has put him so far off his
game, he ended up with a busted knee and a broken heart.
If things aren’t mended fast, he’ll miss the playoffs,
miss his girl, and lose everything. But if Grace is
willing to push him into physical therapy, maybe he can
pull her back into his arms—before their truce unravels.
This time, he’ll do everything it takes to knit their
relationship back together…
ExcerptPushing away from the bathroom counter, Zack ran his
fingers through his still-damp hair. He’d be back in
Cleveland by the end of next week. He could survive that
long moving from hotel to hotel, putting on the rough-and-
tumble playboy act for fans, and playing his heart out on
the ice.But when he did get home, he was heading straight to
Grace’s apartment, and he didn’t intend to let her out of
bed for a week. He was just reaching for the knob when a knock sounded on
the outside door. Couldn’t be room service, he thought,
since he hadn’t called in an order yet. Maybe it was
someone from hotel maintenance to work on the faulty
heating and air system he’d reported earlier. Or better
yet, Dylan, which would save him having to call his buddy’s
room about getting together for dinner. Since he didn’t think a maintenance guy or even Dylan would
appreciate a half-naked greeting, he yanked open the
bathroom door with the intention of grabbing a pair of
jeans and a t-shirt before answering. Lord knew there were
enough discarded clothes scattered around the floor to
dress a third world country. Grace got on his case all the
time about his abysmal housekeeping skills. But then,
that’s why he’d hired a housekeeper. On the way out of the bathroom, he stubbed his toe on the
heavy metal door and cracked his shoulder into the jamb.
Muttering a low oath and cursing miniscule hotel rooms that
weren’t designed to accommodate professional athletes who
topped six feet and pushed the scales at two hundred fifty
pounds--most of it muscle--he changed his mind about
scrounging around for something to wear and went straight
to the hallway door instead, where whoever was on the other
side continued to rap. Bad mood etched clearly on his face, he yanked the door
open . . . and froze when he found Grace staring up at
him. He blinked in surprise, wondering if his earlier
fantasy about having her on the road with him had conjured
her out of thin air. Or maybe he’d slipped on the slick
tile of the bathroom floor, cracked his skull on the edge
of the tub, and was hallucinating. Nice hallucination, though. She looked amazing, her hair a
mass of sexy curls and her lips a glossy rose bow on her
heart-shaped face. “Hey,” he said, running his fingers through his wet hair as
he tried to absorb the fact that she was actually standing
in front of him. “What are you doing here?” “What do you think I’m doing here?” she replied saucily.
Her grin widened as she stepped into the room and pressed
herself against his tall frame. “I came to rock your
world, big boy.” At that declaration, his lips curled and the fog cleared
from his brain. He didn’t know how she’d gotten here or
why she’d decided to drop in on him, but at the moment, he
didn’t particularly care. “Well, okay, then,” he said, wrapping an arm around her
waist. “Come on in. Don’t mind the mess.” Shifting them
both out of the way, he let the door swing closed. “I never do,” she shot back with a chuckle. 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, a wicked glimmer
shining in her ice blue eyes. As far as he was concerned, if she was wearing anything
more than him and a smile, she was overdressed. “I should say so.” He let his gaze wander over her
curvaceous figure and felt his temperature spike. “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 stumbled. They both
glanced down to find her standing in the leg hole of a pair
of discarded BVDs. “Nice,” she said, shaking her foot and kicking the briefs
aside. Zack expected her to return to her little striptease. Was
salivating for it, actually. The small terrycloth towel at
his waist didn’t act as much of a cover to begin with, but
with the front taking on a tell-tale tenting with his
growing hard-on, he might as well have been naked. Instead, Grace slowly turned her head to the side, focusing
on the king size bed. He had no doubt that’s where they’d
end up, but he was in no rush. He was fine with watching
her undress, then maybe taking her up against the dresser,
on top of the round table in the corner, in the chair
currently tucked under the small desk . . . When Grace returned her attention to him, her eyes no
longer glittered with smoldering desire. Her mouth was no
longer tipped up seductively at the corners. In fact, she
looked down-right angry. “Is there something you’d like to tell me?” she asked, her
previously sultry tone replaced with icicles sharp enough
to maim. His brows knit. “Huh?” Zack was used to his fiancée’s rapid-fire changes in mood.
Women in general were mercurial, he’d found, able to go
from laughing to yelling to crying in two seconds flat.
And Grace, he knew, could be more emotional than most. Having her launch into an hour-long tirade because of some
injustice she read about in the newspaper or tear up over a
Hallmark commercial had taken some getting used to. His
favorite, though, was when she started laughing over the
silliest things, like a joke she heard at the studio or a
remembered scene from a movie she’d seen months before. He’d never known her to go from hot-for-his-bod to rip-his-
face-off in the blink of an eye, though. And damned if he
knew what he’d done to piss her off. She cocked her head to the right, and he followed her
gaze. Shock like a blast of cold air hit him full in the
chest and had his heart plummeting to his gut. The blonde in his bed climbed to her knees and let the
sheet drop, revealing a skimpy pink bra and panty set. “Hi,” she chirped with a too-sweet smile. “I didn’t want
to interrupt.” Zack couldn’t have been more surprised if a band of rodeo
clowns had jumped up and started dancing around the room. “What the hell are you doing here?” he snapped. “You know, I was just asking myself the same question.” Unfortunately, this response came from Grace, not the puck
bunny who’d somehow sneaked into his room while he was in
the shower. Fingers flying, Grace rebuttoned her blouse, then charged
for the door, pushing past a still-stunned Zack before he
had a chance to stop her. “Grace, wait.” This was unbelievable. How the hell had this woman gotten
in? And how the hell could Grace believe he’d invited her? Hand on the knob, not bothering to turn around, she shot
back, “Fuck you. Or better yet, let your bimbo do it.” “Grace!” Heedless of his near-naked state, Zack caught the door
before it closed and raced after her. The towel flapped
around his legs as his bare feet pounded down the carpeted
hallway. She was already several yards ahead of him,
ignoring his repeated calls for her to stop, to listen. “Shit,” he muttered as she slammed through the stairwell
door. Tucking his chin into his chest, he put on an extra burst
of speed, determined to catch her . . . then came to a
screeching halt as the elevator to his right whispered open
and an elderly couple stepped out. The woman’s eyes went
round as golf balls and she gasped, turning seven shades of
red. Glancing down, Zack’s own face flared with heat as he
realized he’d lost his towel and was now standing bare-ass
naked in the middle of a Marriott hallway, scaring the
bejeezus out of two people who looked old enough to be his
grandparents. In his estimation, he had three choices: keep after Grace
in the buff and risk blowing out pacemakers or shocking
mothers and small children--not to mention having his
picture wind up on the front page of every tabloid in the
country; go back for his towel, then take off after Grace
again, pretty much risking the same three results--albeit
on a slightly smaller scale; or return to his room, put on
some clothes, and hope Grace hadn’t disappeared from the
hotel completely before he could catch up with heR.
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