Rushed (The Rushed Series) Read Online Free PDF Page B

refreshments. Wow!" I came up behind Em and grabbed a mocha. We'd been served sweets and sweet drinks at every house we'd visited. What I really wanted was a burger. I settled for a cookie.
    Em frowned at me. "You were gone a long time."
    "Was I?" I smiled coyly and took a bite of cookie, trying not to give myself away.
    After the house visit, Em and I grabbed our laptops and went to sit at the edge of the open green beneath the shade of some tall trees. Guys were tossing footballs and flying discs. Music blasted. The air smelled of suntan lotion and sunscreen as Em and I made one of the most important decisions of our college careers.  
    Every other time we preferenced houses, we wrote down the houses we wanted to eliminate. This time, we had to enter in the three houses we wanted to keep. The sororities would then match our choices with their preferences and have a big meeting to hash things out. They had a top-secret system for negotiating when two houses wanted the same girl. We could preference three houses, but we could only get one bid. We either accepted that offer tomorrow at the bid meeting at the SUB, or declined to be Greek.
    Some girls had only been invited to one house visit. They only had the option of writing that house down. Em and I had been to the maximum five house visits. That meant we could list one, two, or three choices. If we only listed one, that was called a suicide bid. Because if that house didn't want us, we'd just knocked ourselves out of getting into a house at all.
    Em stared up at the sky, watching a bird chirp overhead in the branches. "Let's bid the same houses."
    "Serious?" I said. "You know I have to put down the Double Deltsies?"
    She nodded. "I like them."
    I was shocked. If I'd been in her place, I would have chosen one of the other houses, one of two I really loved and felt comfortable in.
    "But you could be in…" I named my two favorite houses. "I think you're definitely a rush crush of a recruiter in each house."
    Em shrugged and looked away like she didn't want me to see what she was thinking. I hoped I hadn't misjudged her. I had thought she was real, not like the girls who just wanted popularity at any price.
    "And you're Morgan's rush crush!" She made a point of watching the guys toss the football.
    I rolled my eyes, thinking about how Morgan had told me to suicide bid. "I can't believe you'd sacrifice for me and take the chance of becoming a Double Deltsie."
    "You're such a brat, Alexis!" She took a deep breath, turned her head toward me, and frowned. "I would kill to be in your shoes. I'm not doing this for you. I'm doing it for me."
    Before I could reply, my cell phone buzzed. "My mom," I said to Em, and took the call. "Mom!"
    "Hey, baby kid! How was your last day of rush? What did you think? Aren't the Double Deltsies fabulous!" Mom's voice was full of missing me, mixed with sunshine, hope, and a heavy dose of trying to influence me.  
    I hesitated. "Everything was great!" I feigned her perkiness and went for broke. "The Double Deltsies were really nice to me. I think I'm still one of their main recruiter's rush crushes."
    "Of course you are, baby! Why wouldn't you be? Sorority greatness is in your blood."
    It was hard to imagine my aging, graying, slightly plump mom had ever been a partying Double Deltsie. But I suspected, from what she'd told me about her college experiences, that they weren't the top house in her day. And that they were now was part of the reason she pushed me so hard to pledge them. Their prestige impressed her. The college girl she had been showed through in her voice and she sounded almost girlish—the pride, the desire to live through me, her hopes that I would have the excellent college experience that she had had. Her soaring hopes for my future and career.
    "There are two other houses that I like a lot, too," I said, testing for wiggle room. "I think I could really fit in those as well. The girls are fun and friendly, welcoming…"
    There was a