Perception (Club Destiny #6)(103)
Author: Nicole Edwards

Certainly not about Mercedes dominating her.

Holy crap. Had she really agreed to this?

Xander’s grin was quite sexy, but Clarissa’s nerves were on edge and she couldn’t find it in herself to admire him for long.

“Probably not, little girl.”

“Little girl?” Clarissa retorted, her hands flying to her hips as she faced off with the behemoth. Her inner bitch was making its presence known.

“You’re pretty fucking hot when you’re pissed, you know that?”

He was doing this on purpose. Clarissa took a deep breath, exhaled. Another. She continued the pattern until she regained some of her composure. He was purposely riling her up.

“Don’t worry, little girl. I’m sure all of the aggression will be directed at me tonight.”

The words didn’t make her feel any better. Part of her hoped she’d get to be a participant in this, the other part of her was scared senseless.

“And I’m not little,” she murmured under her breath. And damn sure not a girl, she thought to herself.

The enormous laugh that erupted from Xander reverberated through the room, his deep, dark voice shook her to her core. Clarissa stared at him, his well sculpted back to her as he paced across the small space.

“Little girl, compared to me, you’re tiny.”

Ok, so he had her there.

When he turned to face her again, his face was serious, and Clarissa found herself holding her breath.

“Can you do this, Rissa?” His voice was much lower than before, and his bright green eyes were so intently focused on her, Clarissa shuddered.

“Can you?” she countered. “I thought you were a big, bad Dom. How the hell does that happen? Are you a switch or something?”

Xander laughed again. “Been reading up on terminology, I see.”

Clarissa smiled at him then. Yes, during her time as a trainee – which hadn’t been all that long – she had been doing her homework, thank you very much.

“And no, I’m not a switch. In fact, if you want the honest truth, this is making me fucking insane.”

Clarissa was startled by his candidness. She didn’t know him well and yet here he was, letting her know that he wasn’t all that fond of this situation.

“I can do this,” she finally told him, adding as much steel into her tone as she could muster. She figured if he could do this, be in a position that he clearly wasn’t all that comfortable with, then she could too.

“Good,” he said with a small smile. “I’m looking forward to seeing how this all plays out.”

Well that made two of them.

Clarissa forced a smile, mentally asking the butterflies in her tummy to quiet down a bit. She could feel the echo of her nerves deep in her chest, and she wasn’t all that fond of the feeling.

Xander moved past her again, this time going toward the wall that looked out over the club and Clarissa followed the path of his gaze. She saw Mercedes talking to a man, a very attractive man. He looked really familiar, but she knew she had never met him before.

“Who is that?” The question came out, sounding every bit as nosy as it was. She’d have to learn to keep her mouth shut.

“Trent Ramsey,” Xander answered, clearly amused.

Trent Ramsey. Trent Ramsey. Why did she know that name?

“Oh, my God! The Trent Ramsey? Like from the Dillon Chronicles?” Trent Ramsey, the famous, and incredibly handsome actor of one of the most popular movie series of her generation.

“That’d be him,” Xander confirmed with a rumbling chuckle.

Clarissa was grateful that Xander didn’t explain more. She had enough going on in her brain to even worry about having a famous actor in the same building she was in. No, she was more worried about what Mercedes had in store for her. And how in the world she was going to remember to refer to the woman as Mistress M or Ma’am. Holy crap. This wasn’t going to be easy.

Not that Clarissa needed easy, but she felt like a jumbled mess when she was around the woman. There was definitely something very intimidating about her.

And to think Clarissa had been completely convinced that Xander was a Dom. Before tonight anyway. Yet here he was, about to be dominated by Mercedes Bryant. Good grief, this was confusing.

Needless to say, since the very first time she’d met Mercedes years ago, Clarissa found herself both in awe of her and terrified of her at the same time. And now this. If she could dominate a man like Xander, there was no way she’d stand a chance against the woman. But, deep down, she knew without a doubt that Mercedes wouldn’t hurt her. At least not on purpose.

She didn’t know Xander as well as she knew Shane and Mercedes, mainly because she hadn’t had the opportunity to see him on a more casual level, outside of the club very often. However, she did know that Mercedes was incredibly good friends with both Xander and Shane. Always had been. She could sense there was a level of trust between the three of them.