Page 54 of In Colton's Custody (Coltons of Mustang Valley)

“Well, have a good night.” He headed toward the door.

“Are you going to visit your dad in the hospital again?” she asked from behind him.

Was she trying to delay his departure instead of rushing him out the door?

“After dinner. Mom said she would watch Harper.”

Neither mentioned what had happened when they’d visited Payne together, but that memory hung in the air between them, an uninvited presence in the room.

He’d just turned to the door again, when a sound behind him brought him back around. All of Willow’s employees stood in the doorway, odd expressions on their faces. Candace had passed off Luna to Tori and had a tablet and a stylus in her hands instead.

Willow’s gaze moved from her employees to the tablet and back. “What’s going on?”

Candace rolled her lips inward as she took a step forward. “We thought you’d want to see these.”

“A one-star review!”

Willow knew she would upset Luna if she didn’t keep her voice down, but she couldn’t help herself as she stared down at the Clamor app, open on the tablet. Her heart was beating fast enough to explode in her chest.

“Unfortunately, not just one,” Candace said.

The older woman reached over and slid a thumb up the side of the screen, bringing up a series of reviews, each with a clear dearth of stars.

“Oh my gosh. One-star, two-star, one-one-one? How did this happen? How did you even find this?”

Tori slid forward, bouncing and shushing a nervous Luna. “Little Derrick’s mom told me we should check it out. It didn’t seem right to her.”

“That’s because it isn’t.”

Willow blinked at the sound of Asher’s deep voice. For a second, she’d forgotten that he was still there, but relief filled her that he was.

“‘Unsanitary conditions’? ‘Uncaring staff’? ‘Questionable disciplinary practices’?” She glanced up at him over the screen. “It’s all garbage. None of it’s true.”

“I know that.” He crossed over to her and used his index finger to gesture from Harper to Alicia, who nodded and lifted the child from his arms.

He extended a hand toward the tablet that Willow held. “Do you mind if I look at it?”

She waited as he scrolled through the damning words. Was she hoping he would know how to fix this when she didn’t have a clue?

Asher glanced up again and pointed to the screen with the stylus. “Trolls. Good ones, too. Look. None of these reviews have the same date. A few appear to have been written last summer. Is that possible?”

Willow shook her head. “I don’t check it every day, but none of those were there last month. Or even last week.”

“Right. You said you had a four-and-a-half-star average.”

She leaned in close enough to see that the number had dropped to one and a half. “How can this be happening? Who would do something like this?”

“You said the letter you received warned you they would destroy your business. Well, they’re giving it their best shot.”

She gripped her head in her hands. “What can I do?”

Candace stepped forward and crossed her arms. “You mean what can we do?”

The other two women automatically nodded, and Asher did the same.

“First, I would contact the Clamor app’s customer service department and contest these reviews,” Asher said. “You can tell them that despite their varying dates, the posts were all added in the past...week?”

“That’s right,” Willow said.

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