Page 22 of Good Losers (Lochkelvin Academy)

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Captain Porthos sticks by his side like glue.

He follows his master when he reaches out to grab a toweling robe. I try to get rid of the crazy idea that I’ve seen Oscar Munro, PM of the country and Rory’sdad, in nothing but tight black swimming trunks.

“Well?” he asks, with the same whip-fast brusqueness in his tone that makes me feel attacked. Nothing’s fast enough or good enough for this man. “Do I need to inform security that a strange girl has managed to find her way inside my private chambers? A girl who dares to spy on me as Iswim?”

“N-no, sir.” I don’t know what it is about Oscar Munro, but he puts me on edge instantly. I never call anyonesir, and yet… “I’m with Rory, sir. I-I…”

“Stop stuttering.”

I shut up. I swallow. I stare up at him with wide, wide eyes.

He’s so tall and broad, and I have to tilt my head back to look at him fully, yet at the same time I’m somewhat disarmed. Whenever I’ve seen him on TV or in person, he’s either teamed an elegant suit with a classic silk tie, or knee-high leather hunting boots with a dark wool trench coat. It seems vastly unfair that he can still radiate the same kind of masculine power, the same sleek leonine energy, in nothing but a pair of black swimming trunks and a toweling robe.

Part of it is my being starstruck, no doubt. He’s the ruler of the country. No matter what you think of him, he’s as polarized as anything else in this timeline — love or hate, zealot or bigot, politics is a cathedral and Oscar Munro is its bishop. To some, he commits cardinal sins, to others he’s more sinned against than sinner and his detractors are the ones who need to be converted.

I’ve never met a man of such impressive stature before. I’m just a girl from another country who’s somehow involved myself in a world to which I don’t belong.

He’s Rory’s dad… and that, that just adds an even stranger dimension to this late-night tryst.

He stares me down, fastening the tie of his inscribed robe with a leisurely flourish, as though he has ample time in the world to figure me out. His earlier warning about calling security had been nothing but bluster; I don’t think he considers me a threat at all.

“Are you an owl, too?” he throws out suddenly.

“What?”

“A night owl.” Before I can answer, he lifts a hand and says, “Wait here.”

Captain Porthos follows his master loyally into a small off-shoot cubicle, only to be guided out again in an instant. I realize after the whispered push and pull of fabric that it’s Oscar Munro’s private changing room, and my face darkens to a horrific shade of tomato when I realize he’s undressing on the other side.

“Well?” he barks, and I hear the pop of buttons, the snap of a waistband.

“I… I suppose, sir. Idohave a habit of wandering at night.”

“It’s a good habit to possess,” he says with a kind of knowingness that makes me believe he may very well be a kindred spirit. “Secrets are uncovered at night, though the truth is only ever revealed in daylight.”

His words feel wise, shaded with the wisdom and maturity his age and experience command.

The door reopens, and Oscar Munro appears in a dark fleecy robe and soft, plum-colored pajamas. His wet blond hair is slicked back, his sharp angular face almost as stern as his voice. He looks so astonishingly like an older Rory that it hurts me just looking at him.

“I should go,” I state carefully, not quite able to meet his piercing eyes. “I’m sorry to have disturbed y—”

“Wait,” he says again, almost as demanding as his son. I do as he says, watching Captain Porthos with his tongue lolling from his mouth, happy to be reunited with his master. “I could use the company. I’ve only just returned from London and it has been an arduous few days. Small mercies for Parliamentary recess.”

I get the impression I’m unable to refuse even if I wanted to — and I don’t know if Idowant to. This situation is far outside my comfort zone, and… I like that. I like this newness, the novelty of it, the fact that I’m engaged in private conversation with the leader of the UK and no one even knows. It’s a secret, a post-midnight secret, between a girl hungry for knowledge and a man so high up in his career and necessary to the world that it’s no wonder he seeks distraction.

He leads me to part of the manor I’ve never been before, using concealed stairways to get there. I’m pretty sure I’m inside the area of the manor that had been a black blotch in my mind, one of the sealed-off eastern wings of Lochkelvin dedicated solely to the master of the house’s private pursuits.

While the paintings in the rest of the manor had been light and bright, of dancing Degas girls and performance rehearsals, here they take on a darker, more gothic turn. Skulls and dead flowers. Various shades of black and brown, umber and ash. Bloody knives and faces contorted in pain. An overwhelming sense of grotesque horror.

Oscar Munro leads me into a low-lit mahogany room that would be spacious if it weren’t for the number of ornaments cluttering it up. He slumps into a large maroon wingback chair beside an already roaring fire. A series of newspapers lie spread open on a nearby table, along with a small pair of wire-rimmed spectacles and their case. On top of the newspapers is something I recognize with an almighty flash of panic: Finlay’s manuscript for Benji.

What the fuck, I think to myself, dizzy with the realization.What the actual fuck?

Rory wasn’t lying.

Finlay wasn’t lying.

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