Rosario had gone a further two steps before she realised Lyra wasn't with her any more. She turned into the flood of questions, hearing loud and clear the mounting panic: meeting your dad for the first time was a huge thing for anyone, and most people didn't have to cross through hordes of faeries and real-life saints and lying-ass truth gods to get there. This was a whole lot.
The look on Lyra's face said she was speeding way on ahead to catastrophe, so Rosario laid the facts out slow and patient as she returned to her friend's side and linked a hand round her arm. "Johnny and Elaine say he's good people. And his work, the migrant aid stuff, that's legit." Rosario had gone digging after Patrick had replied to Lyra's first email, fully expecting to find more of the kind of nothing that had frustrated her earliest online searches for her own bio-dad. In fact, it'd been ridiculously easy to find info on Patrick and the nonprofit he worked for. No pictures and nothing biographical, but it was a hell of a lot more than the man-shaped digital void she'd found where Archer Goldenhawk II should've been. Apparently her bio-dad was just Like That.
But anyway, aside from backing up what he'd said about his work, everything she'd found online suggested it was a highly rated not-for-profit. No weird religious stuff and no ulterior pro-life motives, either (she'd checked).
"And I've seen the emails too, and my impression's same as yours. And," she finished practically, "if he does turn out to be a dick, you gimme a look and I'll empty my drink in his lap and we'll bounce."