Her father didn't leave with the delegation.
Cord found her twenty minutes later — standing in the corridor outside the main hall, still, the expression of a man who had made a decision while everyone else was moving and was now waiting to see if it cost him.
He told her with the specific neutrality of someone leaving the choice entirely to her. Cole was at the south tree line. Alone. Unarmed. Had been there for fifteen minutes.
"He's alone?" Mira asked.
"Perimeter has eyes on him." Cord paused. "He's just standing there."
She went.
Because she needed to hear it from him — the actual thing, outside the performance of a negotiation table, without the script Ryden had sent him with. She needed to stand in front of her father and hear the thing he hadn't said in the hall.
He looked old
