This analysis is based on dozens of interviews with Robert Bentley staffers, campaign workers and associates, on court and public records, sworn testimony, legislative findings and personal experience over the last two years.

On the morning of March 24, 2016 - the day after then-Gov. Robert Bentley stood in blinding camera lights and admitted speaking clumsy love lines to his top political aide - the governor's press office sent him this rundown of the day's news:

AP: Alabama legislature approves General Fund budget

AL.com: Constitutional amendment would declare that life begins at conception

Montgomery Advertiser: VictoryLand, GreeneTrack bills approved by committees

On and on it went, a dozen stories of politics and policy - all the news fit to read in the Alabama atmosphere. There was no mention of scandal, not a word on the most explosive story in the state; the most important story to his life, his career and his legacy. It was the same every single day that followed.

Gov. Robert Bentley was in a bubble.

This is the story of how he came to be there and how, in the span of seven years, he climbed to the peak of Alabama politics, achieved more than anyone thought possible, and tumbled over the edge.

The Beginning

Robert Bentley was, by anyone's standard, Alabama's accidental governor. He was a small-town doctor and back-row legislator who polled about 3 percent support when he chose to run for governor in 2010.

Robert Bentley campaigning in 2010 (file)

His rise was stunning. With help from friends and campaign staff in his hometown -- backed by powers at the University of Alabama, the Alabama Education Association and a core that became known as the Tuscaloosa Brain Trust -- he beat Bradley Byrne in the primary and Democrat Ron Sparks in November.

Despite his House seat, he convinced Alabama he was an outsider's outsider. He was a devoted family man and he would not be corrupt, he said, because he didn't need money. He was a doctor, after all, so he wouldn't even take a salary.

By the time he faced Parker Griffith in the 2014 governor's race he was a different man. The country doctor was gone. The man who sometimes forgot to put on a jacket in the Legislature, who campaigned in short sleeves, was slicker and straighter and almost Brooks Brothers by his second term. He beat Griffith like his beloved Crimson Tide beats a PAC 12 opponent.

The landslide was historic, and Bentley entered his second term with a mandate, a 63-to-36 percent coronation. He was trusted and revered, a man who stood for the things Alabama admires.

It was, we know now, a mirage.

Because Bentley's personal and professional life had already begun to unravel.

"He listened to her like she was the Bible."

By 2013 - even as Bentley prepared for re-election - he had begun to push away the people closest to him.

He chose not to rehire Angi Horn Stalnaker as campaign manager, despite the fact she had run his first miraculous campaign. Instead he chose Rebekah Caldwell Mason, a woman he met at First Baptist Church of Tuscaloosa, who he felt a bond with and wanted to help. He had already hired Mason's husband, Jon, to a $91,000 state position over "faith-based services," and despite her lack of experience or apparent qualifications, he gave his campaign to her. Stalnaker and others still loyal to the governor would serve in other roles.

It was in the middle of 2013, former staffers say, that Mason issued an edict saying Bentley was not to be shown negative news, whether in daily briefings or conversation.

It was shocking to those who had helped him reach office. Anyone in power needs truth as armor. They need someone to tell them to shut up or to brush their teeth, or to warn them when political winds blow ill.

Angi Horn Stalnaker argues with ex-Gov. Bentley over a bill. She later confronted both Mason and Bentley about the affair. (special)

But such truths were frowned upon. Staffers who spoke bluntly were dismissed, or maligned, or punished.

Mason, some said, drew closer to Bentley by telling him, in meetings with staff, that those who questioned him "don't believe in you like I do."

"The people love you," Mason told Bentley again and again. "They don't understand the way the people love you."

It was a frequent and maddening refrain.

"They don't respect you as governor," Mason would say. Or "God put you here."

A former cabinet member, who later fell out with Bentley because of Mason's increasing role, said the governor began to ignore friends and trusted advisers, and despite Mason's questionable credentials, Bentley heard only her.

"He listened to her like she was the Bible," Spencer Collier said.

Bentley grew closer to Mason, and farther from all those who made him.

By the start of 2014 even the Tuscaloosa Brain Trust began to step back, to distance itself from the governor. Paul Bryant Jr. quietly retreated, and supporters such as longtime Bentley accountant Mike Echols began to question him. Friend and staffer Blaine Galliher walked away, Chief of Staff Seth Hammett felt as if he was not being heard, and old legislative buddies - and staunch supporters - were ignored by a man who seemed to believe only the words Mason whispered in his ear.

And those whispers were a concern, even before the impossible thought of an affair occurred to any of them. Staff members knew they had to be careful about what they said to Bentley, because if he heard something more than once he was apt to repeat it in public.

So it wasn't surprising, in speeches and interviews and public comments, that Masonisms began to slip from his lips.

The people love me.

I was put here by God.

It made seasoned staff members cringe. It made columnists like me salivate.

But Bentley didn't see it. He was handed only the good news.

"It is illegal to record the governor!"

It was early in 2014 that Bentley's wife, Dianne Bentley, began to suspect something was amiss in her marriage. After almost 50 years her husband did not look at her the same way, nor hold her hand the way he used to, and when she began to see his suggestive text messages with Mason, she acted.

Working with aide Heather Hannah, and possibly with her own children, she used an app on her phone - stuck in her purse when she left the room - to record their conversations. And that was the beginning.

Staff members were stunned in April of 2014 when Bentley stormed into a meeting exclaiming "It is illegal to record the governor!"

"We didn't know what he was talking about," a former confidante said.

But they soon would.

Despite the political success - Bentley was soaring in the polls and erecting billboards with the Mason-advised and soon-to-be-broken promise of "More Jobs, Less Government, No New Taxes," - those in his own circle were seething.

He was getting bad political advice. He was becoming somebody he wasn't.

"If I can't go he can't go."

Legislators had pushed for an education budget that would fully fund PEEHIP, the teacher's insurance program, but House Speaker Mike Hubbard and Senate Majority Leader Del Marsh were convinced there was no money for teacher pay raises. They discussed it with Bentley, who told them he would support their budget.

But after the Legislature passed it, Bentley had a change of heart.

"Over the weekend Rebekah talked him out of it," one former lawmaker said. "He lied to Mike and Del."

It may seem a small thing, inside-baseball politics. But if a governor loses the strongest voices in both houses of his legislature - particularly a legislature as powerful as Alabama's is set up to be - he loses his clout and ability to lead.

Rebekah Mason, left, and Gov. Robert Bentley descend the steps of the state capitol. (AL.com file photo)

To make matters worse, Mason had begun to emphasize to Bentley that he was the chief magistrate of Alabama, and he took it to heart. He began to speak publicly about being "chief magistrate," and began to order law enforcement officials to do his bidding.

He claimed powers and authority that did not belong to him.

The same can be said for Mason. In mid 2014, Bentley was chosen by the National Rifle Association to receive an award - a big thing for a GOP politician, particularly in Alabama. The presentation was to be in the Midwest, and the date and location were mentioned in a staff meeting.

"I can't go on that date," Mason said.

"Then I'm not going," Bentley responded.

Staff members tried to convince him it was politically important. Spokeswoman Jennifer Ardis could go with him. He was, after all, involved in a political race. But he was adamant. And so was she:

"If I can't go, he can't go," Mason said.

Dementia?

The middle of 2014 was chaos for Bentley, though his staff scrambled to keep it quiet in the days leading up to the election.

It became clear that Bentley family members had recordings of Bentley phone calls with Mason. Bentley's two closest confidantes other than Mason - bodyguard Ray Lewis and Alabama Law Enforcement Secretary Spencer Collier - saw suggestive texts between the two, and both confronted him.

Bentley with former security chief Ray Lewis. (special)

Collier said he asked Bentley about the affair in August, and Bentley vowed he would break it off - but didn't. Bentley actually told Lewis to go upstairs and break up with Mason on his behalf, and Lewis did it in the lieutenant governor's office. Still, it did not end.

Bentley's children were worried about their family and their dad. Some were concerned for his health. They thought, perhaps reasonably, that his change in behavior might be due to medical problems. They went so far as to make him an appointment at the Cleveland Clinic - somewhere he could receive the best care and not be recognized - to be tested for dementia.

But Bentley would not go. He saw it as a trick, an attempted coup. Because he knew - everyone knew - that if he was diagnosed with dementia he would be obligated to pull out of the governor's race. He refused.

Lemons to lemonade

In August of 2014 I began a series of columns about the governor's many flights on state aircraft, and the amount of money Ray Lewis received -- he was almost doubling his pay -- in overtime on the protection detail.

Former staffers in the administration said last week that Mason had claimed credit for "feeding" that Lewis story. Given politics, that's possible, though the initial tip came from grizzled old troopers with personal knowledge and their own axes to grind. But the implications of such a claim are enormous, and telling.

For if Mason did convince those men to push that story, she hastened her own demise. Despite the fact that Bentley knew and approved Ray Lewis's overtime, he demoted Lewis and eventually forced him into retirement. Lewis, like Collier, would become a formidable and believable witness to all of Bentley's sins.

Yet Bentley had a different reaction. On Aug. 17, 2014, the day of the story about the flights and pay, Bentley demanded that all his staffers -- but not Mason -- sign confidentiality agreements. In some meetings he refused to allow his staff to bring cell phones into the room.

There was no mention of those stories in the press clippings selected for him, though. The next day his report began with a story headlined:

"Governor Bentley buys a lemonade to help BARC."

BARC is an animal shelter.

"We can do anything. We're famous!"

November of 2014 should have been a high point in the life of any politician. Bentley doubled Griffith's votes to win a second term. But a day of elation turned into a nightmare. Bentley thought his scheduling director, Linda Adams, had a recording of him and Mason, and as the post-election celebration played on, he sent Collier to Greenville to confront her. He was chief magistrate.

Collier says he had already warned Bentley that chasing the recording was dangerous. He says he previously told him to leave Heather Hannah and others alone, but Bentley ordered him to go. And he went.

And trouble piled up.

Bentley, according to the sworn testimony in a report by the House Judiciary Committee, tried to get Mason a job with Alabama Power or UA, but nobody wanted her. He decided to hire her as his chief political adviser, but was warned it would be a risk. If she was a state employee the trysts and trips could quickly become crimes. So ACEGOV, a shadowy non-profit, was set up to pay her from private sources. After months of research by investigators and media, we still can't say for certain who contributed.

Dianne Bentley

But as the election ended and inauguration loomed, Bentley was on top of the political world. And Mason was right there with him.

A campaign staffer asked Mason what she planned to do after the race.

"We can do anything," she said. "We're famous."

But trouble was coming. It was coming fast.

In December of 2014 an event occurred that has become known in Alabama simply as "The Wallet." Bentley fought with his wife and drove away mad - without his wallet. A state aircraft took off from Montgomery, picked up the wallet in Tuscaloosa and brought it to Bentley at the beach.

"Will that woman be there?"

By January's inauguration day, Bentley's personal life was in ruins. Members of his own family did not want to come to the ceremony or the inaugural ball, and Dianne Bentley had asked, "Will that woman be there?"

Mason was there. In a dress the staff described as "scandalous."

Collier remembers how the governor and Mrs. Bentley walked in silence through the corridors before the swearing in. But as they reached the door, opening to the public, she reached down and grabbed the governor's hand.

"The only reason she did it is because Dianne Bentley has a world of class," he said.

That night troopers mapped and remapped ways to "set picks" for Mason if she came too close, and extraction was planned if the First Lady became upset.

"We had a plan to get her out of there quickly and quietly," Collier said.

Jon and Rebekah Mason. This dress distressed staff and Mrs. Bentley. (special)

It was a long and sordid year. At one point a fight erupted over what tie Bentley should wear to a speech -- one chosen by Mason or one chosen by the First Lady. Bentley chose the Mason tie, but never wore it.

Somehow -- no one will say exactly -- the tie was destroyed before he could put it on.

So while it may have been a surprise to the state when Ms. Bentley filed for divorce a month after her 50th anniversary, it was no surprise to those who had witnessed the last several months.

But the indignities continued.

Mason, the other woman, wrote a statement for Mrs. Bentley to read about the divorce. Ms. Bentley did not give it.

Mason apparently helped devise a plan to close driver license offices in rural counties -- a decision for which both Bentley and Collier took substantial political heat.

And in October rumors of the affair began to blow up in blogs and social media. They were greeted mostly with disbelief.

All the while Bentley continued to tell the public he was put in office by God, humbled by how much the people loved him.

He believed it. He deserved it. So he took Mason and Ardis and others on a state plane to the Republican Governor's Association meeting in Las Vegas. He didn't attend a lot of meetings while he was there, according to testimony. He did go backstage at a Celine Dion concert.

Revelations of that trip -- and his attempt to cover it up -- would later lead to charges of campaign violations that helped to bring him down.

Another turning point came in December 2015 when the governor, in an interview with AL.com, for the first time addressed the rumors of the affair. He denied it.

Members of the Bentley family and the Tuscaloosa Brain Trust felt the story allowed Bentley to blame his wife for their marital troubles. Bentley's family further felt he'd violated an agreement made with Dianne Bentley not to throw stones in the wake of the divorce.

It would come, perhaps ironically, to mobilize state employees and family members and ignite a fire under those who would see Bentley's sins unveiled.

The beginning of the end

At that time, though, there was far more at play than politics. House Speaker Hubbard was facing trial on ethics charges, special prosecutor Matt Hart was scouring the Statehouse and the Capitol, and Mason became convinced she was next on Hart's to-do list.

Prosecutor Matt Hart questions witness Minda Riley Campbell in one of the memorable moments of Mike Hubbard's trial.

She began to step across the line, and that was the biggest political blunder of the entire saga. She sat in on meetings with Collier and the Governor and tried to prevent Collier from responding to a request for an affidavit in the Hubbard case. When Collier signed an affidavit for Hart - something he thought was part of his sworn duty - Bentley and Mason were furious.

Bentley put Collier on medical leave for back problems and installed former Bentley bodyguard Stan Stabler in his place. At the same time, though, Bentley told another AL.com reporter Collier's leave had more to do with punishment for disobeying him than Collier's health.

Mason and the governor's office began to push stories about Collier's "instability." They spoke of personal problems but never provided details. They treated him like he stole something, but never provided evidence.

They took a man who knew too much, and pushed him away. They took a man who had been loyal, and betrayed him. They took a man who kept notes like the investigator he was trained to be, and gave him reason to reveal all.

An affair revealed

On March 22 of last year Spencer Collier called me on the phone as I was driving home from work. He told me he had seen explicit texts between Mason and Bentley and had confronted the governor. He told me what witnesses have since confirmed under oath.

And by the time it was done I was on the side of the road, calling editors to say the top law enforcement officer of Alabama had confirmed a gubernatorial affair. I called the governor's office, leaving detailed messages about the allegations.

It has become part of the public perception that Collier spoke about the affair only because he had been fired. That's not the way I saw it. When I spoke to Collier, I spoke to him as the head of ALEA. When the governor's office got back to me -- saying Collier was crazy and this was all my fault -- they had fired Collier.

Spencer Collier, the day after revealing that Bentley and Mason were involved in an affair.

AL.com published the story that evening, and it exploded. Later that night, about midnight, I received recordings of the phone calls that haunted Bentley until his resignation last week.

AL.com did not publish them immediately because we could not confirm the voice on the phone was Bentley. Hours later, the governor took care of that for us.

Speaking words penned by Mason in a disastrous press conference, Bentley stood in the glow of television lights and denied having a physical affair. But he acknowledged it was his voice on the recordings, and that he was talking to Mason.

So the recordings were widely published. And Bentley became the Luv Guv.

Mason resigned, but remained in contact with Bentley. We learned that Bentley bought burner phones to cover up his affair, that Stabler lied during that ill-fated Bentley press conference, that Bentley took Mason as his "plus-one" to a White House dinner, and that Bentley had erectile dysfunction drugs sent through the mail in his ex-wife's name.

We learned that Bentley sought to discredit Collier through an investigation at ALEA, but the attorney general found more wrong with the investigation than with Collier. Criminal probes began, ethics complaints were filed and impeachment proceedings intensified after it was learned that Mason accompanied Bentley on a state plane to a Trump inaugural event this year. Through it all Bentley received morning briefings of happy news.

The unceremonious end

A week ago Friday, as the state hummed with expectation and news that the House Judiciary Committee would release its damning investigative findings, the governor's morning press briefing contained no mention of problems.

There was a Decatur Daily story about the end of judicial override.

There was a Dothan Eagle piece about the death penalty.

There was an AL.com story on prison reform.

No bad news.

Any governor has responsibility to educate himself about the world around him, of course, but a curtain hung around Bentley. He was so snug in his Rebekah bubble he could not see anything but his margin of victory.

Former Gov. Robert Bentley places personal items in his truck Friday, April 14, 2017, at the Governor's Mansion. (Julie Bennett)

Three days later -- last Monday -- Bentley pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors and resigned the governorship. He spoke to Mason on the phone and was, according to some, advised on what to say. Then he went before cameras again, and gave an ungubernatorial, unapologetic speech to the people of Alabama.

He said he wanted to find a new way to serve Alabama, though critics said it sounded like O.J. saying he'd devote his life to finding the real killers.

Minutes before, Bentley had been in the sally port at the Montgomery County jail, having a mugshot made and fingerprints taken.

There, one cop turned to another and said this:

"I bet he's not saying God put me here now."

Governor's Press Clips for Thursday March 24 2016 by John Archibald on Scribd