Olivia Hamilton was the first parent to withdraw her child from riding lessons at Ali’s ranch. She left a breezy voicemail for Ali just twenty minutes before Callie's lesson saying they couldn't make it. When Ali called back the next day to reschedule, Olivia told her that Callie was "taking a break."

 

Ali was stunned. She'd been working with Callie for two years, and Olivia was an old school friend. It was abrupt, Olivia agreed, but they had other things going on. A few activities just had to take a back seat for a while. "We'll be in touch," she said, rushing Ali off the phone.

 

While Ali was disappointed at both the loss of a student and the loss of the income, she still didn't think anything was amiss until Sarah Foreaker pulled Gillie out of lessons without any warning the following week, making some feeble excuse about extra dance classes. And the next day, her favorite and longest-standing student, Perrie, called to say she couldn't come to class anymore.

 

"Honey, what's wrong?" she probed. In six years of instruction, Perrie hadn't missed a single lesson. Ali had even begun preparing the young girl for barrel-racing competition.

 

"Um," the young girl sniffled, her voice thick with emotion, "I can't take lessons from you anymore, Miss Ali. My mom says--" Perrie covered the phone and she could hear her arguing with her mother. "Something's... um... come up in my schedule and I c-c-can't--" There was some scuffling and then Ali heard Perrie's mother, as clear as day, telling her to hang up.

 

Ali felt physically ill. Obviously it wasn't a coincidence. It was personal. The deepest cut was Perrie, who'd obviously been prompted to call by her mother. It was meant to upset Ali, she was sure of it.

 

She racked her brain for why such a thing might have happened. She paced and worried and tried to make sense of it before heading out for a ride on Tip. What had she done to alienate her students' mothers? She hadn't made her breakup with Bobby public yet, and even if she had it shouldn't matter. Perrie's mother Barbie was a snob, but Ali had worked with Perrie since long before Bobby Dawson was on the scene. What on earth could have happened?

 

It wasn't until later that night when an unknown number texted her phone 'miss ali this is perrie check the keepers blog' that she got any insight as to why her students had all canceled out on her.

 

Wade Stavely, known for his blog persona, "The Keeper," was a source of information and outrage for the communities of Arroyo Flats. A religious conservative with no tolerance for what he called "Modern Day Sins," he took shots at everyone from grocery store clerks to the mayor if he thought they'd done wrong in the eyes of the Lord. Though everyone pretended to roll their eyes at his judgments, local gossip often originated on the blog, making it a must-read for the bored housewives in town.

 

Sure enough, when Ali pulled up the web page, the newest post featured a photo of several Padre Knights working at Cloverleaf's future site. There was Alejandro, his arms bulging as he hefted a bag of mulch, and just beyond him, shielding her eyes, a recognizable blonde woman. Herself.

 

"Working on the Lord's Day, But Not Doing the Lord's Work!" the caption accused. Ali's eyes scanned the article, gathering the gist of it quickly enough. Words and phrases like "thugs," "Satan on wheels," "unwelcome terror in our town," and "drug-peddling scum" swam in her vision. Although she wasn't mentioned by name, she was there in full color, smiling away. Guilty by association.

 

No wonder they had pulled their kids out of lessons. According to the article, Ali had hired drug-dealing felons to help her with her children's program. Never mind that none of the guys were actually felons--or even drug dealers, although she knew their hands were dirty on that account somewhere along the line. The Keeper painted the Padre Knights as hardened criminals, which in turn implicated Ali in their activities. At the least she had poor taste in associates; at the most she was personally involved in their crimes.

 

Oh, God. Mr. Lathrop!

 

Her association with the Padres would get to him somehow, and then he'd want his money back. No way would he allow her reputation to sully his. No chance in hell he would continue to support her work with that much negative attention attached to it. Ali allowed herself a moment or two of full-out choking, heaving sobs before she called the only person she knew could help her get out of such a horrible mess.