“I know just the guys for the job,” David said as he got out his phone and made some calls.
◊◊◊
Crystal was about to pull her hair out of her head. She was so going to kill Taylor.
First, the police showed up because the neighbors had reported a wild drunken party, and they were there to arrest her. She had to let them come inside and have David show them the punch. He’d calmed them down and let them take a few selfies.
Next was the fire department.
“Ma’am, there is no way having that many people in your sorority is safe, so I’ll have to shut you down.”
“Hang on. Let me get David Dawson to talk to you,”
Crystal said.
“The quarterback who set those records last Saturday?”
the grumpy man asked with sudden interest.
“Yes. David’s my boyfriend and helping with our rush.”
“Could you get me a signed jersey?”
“I’m sure I can.”
“What time does this end?”
“Ten.”
“I’ll be back at 10:30 to confirm.”
The rush was scheduled from seven until nine-thirty, and girls began lining up at six-thirty, which was unheard of in LA— no one was ever early. But the lure of meeting David had caused a stir. It could have been partly due to Taylor harassing David until he’d had Lily put it out on his social media.
It didn’t take long to figure out that not all the people who wanted in were USC students. They’d had to check student IDs at the door to turn away the townies who tried to crash. Taylor had sent one of her girls to the other sororities, whose rushes hardly had anyone.
Taylor’s biggest concern was how they would sort through the hundreds of girls who’d come to the party to narrow it down to their goal of fifteen. Would they even be able to remember who was who?
◊◊◊
David would have bailed after the first hour if his uncle hadn’t pounded into his head that you honored your commitments. After making the first batches of mocktails, he’d had to teach a couple of Crystal’s sorority sisters how to make them because Taylor wanted him to let everyone get a picture with him.
That might not have been so bad, but there were so many girls. This was worse than when he did the voting awareness events for Governor Higgins. The only time it had been this bad was at the fundraiser for Washington High, where they ran out of food, and the governor helicoptered in.
The only reasons it wasn’t completely crazy were that it was a Wednesday night, and the sorority house could only hold so many people.
“It looks like you’re having a better day.”
David turned and found the girl whose mother he’d befriended on move-in day.
“Not really. I need a break. Want to sneak out with me?”
“Sure.”
Taylor spotted him.
“I promise I’ll be back.”
David led the girl through the kitchen and out the back door, where it was thirty degrees cooler.
“I never caught your name,” David admitted.
“Emily. Emily Nance.”
She was a vision of loveliness: slender, blond, with high cheekbones, delicate features, and just the hint of breasts that promised fun in the future.
“And, of course, you are Ian Bond,” she teased.
“At your service,” David said with a slight bow.
“I do have one question. That video where those two girls rubbed cream on you ended too soon. What happened afterward?”
David raised one eyebrow.
“I’m asking for my mom,” Emily added quickly.
“Tell your mom that a gentleman never tells.”
“I was asking you.”
David liked her. He waggled his eyebrows.
“I could show you.”
Her whole body turned the cutest shade of pink, making him chuckle.
“Do you want to join this sorority?” David asked.
“I think I do.”
“Then let me introduce you to some key people.”
David led her back in and found Crystal and Taylor in a deep conversation in the kitchen.
“Mind if I interrupt?”
They both gave him a curious look.
“I would like to introduce you to someone you want in your sorority. Meet Emily Nance. She lives in my dorm,”
David said.
Taylor perked up and told Crystal, “Ask him while I get to know Emily and introduce her around.”
David heard Taylor ask if Emily knew him as they walked away.
“We have a problem. Taylor having you blast out our rush on social media may have given us too much of a good thing. I’m afraid we won’t be able to remember all the good ones. She wanted me to ask if you remember any of the girls,” Crystal said.
“I have a list of some you should look at and a bigger list of the ones you don’t want.”
“How do you do that? How do you remember so many people?” Crystal wanted to know.
“My dad always taught my brother and me to network at events like this. We got pretty good at learning people’s names,” David explained and then had a thought. “You might also want to check social media for my name. I would bet that most of the girls who had their pictures taken with me will post them. They’ll also tag everyone in the picture, so you’ll have their names.”
David made his list of those who’d stood out in either a good or bad way and explained why to Crystal. He then went back to meet more girls.
At the end of the night, Alex and the four football players he’d invited—Big Cat, Chuy, Bill, and Bear—all wore stupid grins.
“What are you guys so happy about?”
“Let’s just say that tonight was a target-rich environment. Several hundred hot girls and six guys.”
“I take it you got a few phone numbers,” David correctly guessed.
“The man’s a genius,” Alex said. “Anytime you have something like this again, we’re your boys.”
“I like hearing that. I guess I don’t have to pay you for tonight,” Taylor said as she joined them.
“What do you think, guys?” Bill asked.
They all agreed that Taylor was off the hook. It helped that David didn’t know about the money, so they thought they were volunteering anyway.
Taylor made them give her one girl’s name that they thought would be an excellent addition to the sorority.
David wrote down six more names and eighteen he would avoid.
Alex gave him a ride back to the dorm when he was done.
◊◊◊
Thursday morning, David met with Dr. Liao and the trainers for his daily evaluation.
“I want to get another CT scan because you’re still having headaches, feeling dizzy, and don’t feel right. You’ve indicated that all these symptoms are getting better, but I want to ensure we see improvement in the scans.”
“And if you do?”
“Then we’ll let you start light workouts like riding a stationary bike.”
David had been somewhat happy with the time to heal because he had taken a pounding against UNLV when they did catch him. They’d put a little extra into each tackle. He knew that the first thing to go for an athlete when he didn’t train was stamina. Game-ready was different from just being in shape. Tank had told him the rule of thumb: for every week he sat on his butt, it would take two to three to get him back to where he was before the injury.
While riding a bike would help, it wasn’t enough. David would live with that because you couldn’t fake the tests Dr.
Liao gave him. It was in his best long-term interest not to rush his recovery.
As he came out of the trainers’ room, David spotted his high school teammate Jim Ball lifting with the linemen. The last David had seen him, Alabama had added weight and muscle to his frame. Since then, they’d sculpted his body to the point he was carrying very little fat.