Page 210 of Ironwood Ranch Cowboys

Interesting.

Very interesting.

I sit up straighter.

“What?” Silas asks.

I don’t answer yet, because suddenly my pulse is moving too fast. The folder shouldn’t exist. Not according to current operational structure. Which means one of two things happened:

Either Jake created it independently, or somebody older than Jake did.

Neither possibility comforts me.

I open the directory. Inside sits a compressed archive.

Shadow_Transit_Backup.

My stomach tightens. Because innocent people do not name folders like that.

Silas notices my expression. “Cody.”

I click open the archive.

Hundreds of files populate the screen at once. Email exports, vendor transfers, internal approvals, encrypted transaction records. And right at the top… a correspondence chain.

Between Jake Dorsey and someone labeled only: Investor Rep.

The blood drains slowly from my face.

Beside me, Silas goes completely still.

I open the first email. Then the second. Then the third. Each one colder than the last. Strategic destabilization. Asset weakening. Operational pressure points. Liquidity manipulation.

My eyes scan faster.

Faster.

Until finally one sentence stops everything in my body cold.

Once Ironwood’s valuation drops low enough, acquisition pressure becomes inevitable.

No.

Fuck. This isn’t theft.

The realization hits hard enough to physically hurt.

They weren’t stealing from Ironwood for money alone. They were bleeding the ranch deliberately.

Weakening operational confidence. Creating instability. Manufacturing vulnerability. Setting the ranch up for acquisition.

A takeover.

And sitting in the middle of all of it…

Jake.

Feeding them information. Approving false vendors. Manipulating internal systems. Creating operational strain from inside the ranch itself.