Page 138 of Ironwood Ranch Cowboys

That’s not random intimidation.

The missing card, the notes, the lock, the pressure? It’s to stop me digging deep.

My chair scrapes back hard against the floor as I stand.

Okay. No panic. Panic is for people who aren’t too stubborn to have useful coping mechanisms.

I grab my notebook and start writing.

Dates. Bid windows. Missing fund spikes. Vendor clusters. Development references. Associated approvals. Jake. Legal links. Shell entities. Consulting charges. All of it.

The more I map it, the uglier it gets. The more I need to save this all in various places to keep it safe.

By 10:30, I have three separate backups.

By 11:00, I decide that still isn’t enough.

I print hard copies of the crucial pages, but not all at once, and not in one stack. Too obvious. Too easy to steal, destroy, or “misplace.”

I split them by category, then I slide them into plain folders with labels so dull they should probably come with a sedative.

By lunchtime, I have the evidence spread across my desk in a pattern that makes sense only if you know the logic beneath it, which, unfortunately, I do.

I sit back, rub at my eyes, and finally let myself think the thought all the way through.

Someone wants Ironwood weakened enough to push a larger move.

And if I’m right, if I’m even mostly right, then this is bigger than Jake, bigger than vendor fraud, bigger than one person skimming money for fun.

This is long game territory.

I spend the afternoon pretending to do normal work in between the deeply abnormal work of building a survival strategy out of accounting records.

I answer emails, approve legitimate invoices, check payroll timing, smile at Sherry when she pops in with a question about vendor processing and try not to wonder if she’d notice if I suddenly dragged my filing cabinet onto the lawn and set it on fire.

Around three, I make myself stop and move the backups.

One stays in my room, hidden where no one would look unless they had a deeply specific interest in my collection of black cardigans.

One goes into my camera bag inside a padded lens pouch.

And the third…

The third I take outside. Because I need to be sure before I go forward with this.

There’s a little hollow near the edge of the old fence line behind the staff quarters where the ground dips under a cluster of scrub and pine roots.

It’s not pretty. It’s not dramatic. It’s exactly the sort of place no one notices because there’s nothing to notice there.

Perfect.

I slip the flash drive into a waterproof pouch, crouch down and tuck it under the root shelf, and cover it lightly with old needles and dry earth.

I stand back up with dirt on my fingers and my heart beating like I’ve just buried a body.

Great. Love that this is my life now.

The rest of the afternoon passes in a blur of nerves and fake normalcy.