And she wasn’t sorry that she’d trashed Zack’s apartment, either. Or flushed the two-carat diamond-and-platinum engagement ring he’d given her. Or stolen his dog. On the contrary, she only wished he had a second apartment she could have destroyed, had given her a second ring she could hammer and melt down to a pile of junk, and had a second dog she could abduct.

But she did sort of wish she hadn’t made her abject misery and the details of her broken engagement such a public affair.

She’d always been open and honest on the air, which was what made her show such a hit. If she was having a good day, she shared her happiness with her audience, both in the studio and on the other side of the camera. If she was having a bad day, she used them to talk through it, and nine times out of ten found them more than willing to commiserate.

After all, everyone suffered from bad hair, chipped nails, lost contact lenses, and cramps, right? Letting her fans know she was as normal as the next person made her more human in their eyes, more like someone they would be friends with than an untouchable local celebrity.

This time, however, she suspected she’d gone slightly overboard. Not a lot, just a tad.

For instance, she probably shouldn’t have gone on the air Monday morning with puffy eyes, a red nose, and streaked mascara because no matter how hard the makeup artist tried, she couldn’t stem Grace’s constant flow of tears or stop the makeup from running down her cheeks with them.

She also probably shouldn’t have spent the whole hour ranting and raving and voicing her heartfelt desire for certain parts of Zack’s anatomy to shrivel up and fall off. Or for him to contract a wasting disease. Or for the tramp he’d been with to break out in crusty, oozing sores so the world would know her for the whore she was.

That had been-perhaps, just a smidgen-over the top.

She wouldn’t take it back, though. Nor would she take back the order for her program director to find guests and set up a series of men-are-scum shows for the very near future. She wanted to out the lying, scheming bastards who couldn’t keep their dicks in their pants, and help other women like herself who had been lied to and betrayed by said bastards.

She also wanted to hang Zack upside down by his testicles and use his penis as a voodoo doll, but since he had a good eighty pounds on her and she hadn’t yet figured out a way to hoist him up all on her own, she was willing to settle-for the time being, at least-for knowing that she’d done a good bit of damage to a handful of personal belongings that were near and dear to his heart.

Nosing her silver Lexus into a parking spot between two other cars, she folded down the visor and checked her appearance in the small mirror hidden there. She was at least trying to give a shit about her appearance again, but it had been a rough, ugly week.

Except for lipstick, her makeup was fine, so she applied another quick coat of high-gloss Ruby Slippers-a freebie from one of the major cosmetics companies in hopes that she would wear it on her show and possibly thank them publicly by name.

Her hair could use a little help, but running her fingers through a couple of spiky strands then scrunching in an attempt to curl a few others seemed to work.

What she needed was a spa day. Or at the very least, a trip to the salon. Her roots, which were a slightly darker shade of blond than the rest, were beginning to show.

Being an on-air personality, she didn’t have the luxury of letting herself go. She was expected to have perfect hair, perfect skin, perfect nails, the perfect figure, and the perfect attitude to go with her perfect smile.

And ninety-eight-point-six percent of the time, she succeeded.

This week just happened to be one of the remaining one-point-four percent.

Her attitude ever since walking in on a half-naked Zack with a half-naked puck bunny had pretty much been “Fuck Zack, fuck her appearance, fuck the show, fuck the world.”

Zack’s constant attempts to contact her weren’t helping, either. He’d called her cell and home phones-to grovel and beg for forgiveness, she was sure-so many times, she’d finally blocked his numbers. And everyone at work-hell, everyone she knew-had strict instructions not to let him anywhere near her, whether it was in person or through telephone calls, text messages, or candy-grams.

He was persona non grata, as far as she was concerned, and could go fuck himself, right along with his trail of willing bimbettes.

But because her attitude these days was somewhat less than perky and she had more important things on her mind-like how to torture and kill a man without leaving a trace-her hair and nails had pretty much fallen to the very bottom of her list of concerns.

Ironically, it was Zack’s big, slobbery, pain-in-the-ass dog that had kept her sane and was starting to help her climb out of her deep, dark pit of despair.

Oh, Zack was still very much at risk of having an armed mercenary cut off the protruding parts of his body. She’d actually gone so far as picking up a copy of one of those magazines-Mercenary Monthly or some such-at a newsstand on her way home from work in hopes of finding a classified ad that read, Will kill your cheating ex for cash.

But before she’d had a chance to thumb through it, dumb old Bruiser had ambled up to the side of the bed, nudged her in the thigh, then hefted his way up to sleep next to her, his giant head and floppy, drool-covered lips resting in her lap. For the first ten seconds, she’d scowled and tried to push him away. Tried to figure out how to roll him off the bed and out of her room so she could lock the door.

She didn’t even like the stupid Saint Bernard. She’d only brought him home with her because she knew it would kill Zack to find him missing. Even now, she imagined Mr. Hump-Anything-That-Moves pacing, tearing at his hair, bemoaning the fact that his beloved behemoth had been taken by his furious, and very possibly homicidal, ex-girlfriend.

It had taken only one glance from Bruiser’s wide brown eyes to win her over, though. Well, that, and a deep, contented sigh and a long swipe of his wet tongue along her cheek. He’d done that, and she’d melted into a puddle of doggy-loving goo right along with the pint of Chunky Monkey resting on her bedside table.

She’d spent the rest of the evening cuddling with the big bag of fur under her favorite comforter while they’d both finished the ice cream and watched Fatal Attraction twice in a row. Of course, she’d had the presence of mind to cover Bruiser’s eyes during the boiling bunny scene. Being a dog, he would probably eat a rabbit if given half a chance-heck, he ate socks, sneakers, and tennis balls on a regular basis-but she didn’t want him to think she endorsed animal abuse of any kind.

The next morning, when she’d awakened with Bruiser still snuggled beside her, filling one side of the bed the way Zack used to, she’d suffered a brief moment of sadness. Most women, she supposed, would prefer to share their beds with a six-foot-six blond Adonis of a professional hockey player rather than a two-hundred-pound brown and white Saint Bernard with a drool stain the size of Jenna’s Volkswagen under his right jowl.

Despite the damage to her fifteen-hundred thread count Egyptian-cotton sheets, there was something extremely comforting about having Bruiser there. His steady breathing, his soft fur, his radiating warmth. She’d wrapped her arms around him, given him a hard hug, and decided that life couldn’t be all that bad if the sight of Zack’s dumb dog could bring a smile to her face.

That name, though-Bruiser-would have to go. It reminded her too much of Zack, in a way that the Saint Bernard himself didn’t. And she suspected a trip to the veterinarian was in their very near future. Breath that noxious simply could not be healthy.