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CLOCKWORK

Penulis: Laney L. R.
last update Terakhir Diperbarui: 2025-11-13 06:19:37

ALANA

By dawn, the air still tasted like smoke and iron.

The sky over the estate had gone that bruised gray color—the kind that looks quiet until you realize it’s just holding its breath before the storm breaks again.

I hadn’t slept. Neither had Zach.

But he pretended to, stretched on the couch in my office, one arm thrown over his eyes, boots still on. The sight almost made me smile. We both knew what that was—control disguised as exhaustion.

He wasn’t resting. He was listening. Waiting.

Like a wolf pretending to nap while the forest burns.

I turned back to the reports on my desk. Leone’s bomb had missed our heart but cracked one of the outer arteries. Supply line delays. Four wounded. Two dead. Loyal men. Ones who believed in us, who built this empire knowing the risk.

Their names bled ink across the paper.

And that was all I could stand before the words turned to noise.

I shut the file.

Zach stirred. “You’re not going to stop, are you?”

I didn’t turn. “Would you?”

A low sound—half
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  • Whispers of Loyalty   STAY

    ALANAI didn’t really sleep.My body wanted to — begged to — but my mind hovered in that thin, trembling space between rest and vigilance. Every time I drifted toward unconsciousness, something cold tugged me back, like a warning threaded through my veins.So I stayed there, in the darkness, pressed against the warmth of Zach’s chest, listening to his heartbeat pound harder than any resting pulse should.He slept like a man fighting demons behind closed eyes.His jaw was tight even in sleep. His arm locked around me like he expected someone to rip me away at any second. And every so often, he made this small, broken sound — too soft to be a groan, too sharp to be breath — as if something chased him even here.I watched his face in the dim light, tracing every line, every shadow.He looked younger like this.Vulnerable.Human in a way the world never got to see.And God, it hurt.Because I knew that the moment he woke, he’d armor himself again. He’d bury this softness beneath steel and

  • Whispers of Loyalty   ICE

    ZACHI didn’t remember falling asleep.One moment I was in the war room, half a dozen files spread across the table, eyes burning from hours of scanning coded messages and prophecy fragments, the next—A jolt.A sharp, metallic taste on my tongue.My neck snapping upright as if someone had dragged me out of a nightmare by the throat.I blinked, vision blurring before it sharpened again. My head throbbed, temples pulsing. My heartbeat pounded so hard it felt like it was trying to punch its way out of my ribs.I’d been out for an hour at most.Two if I’d really lost control.But the sun hadn’t moved much, shadows barely shifted across the room.Still—something was wrong.The air felt wrong.Too still.Too cold.Too tight around the edges.Like the house itself had stopped breathing.I straightened slowly, instinct coiling tight in my chest. The hairs at the back of my neck lifted. That jagged, electric pulse—the one that had saved my life too many times to count—spiked hard.Someone

  • Whispers of Loyalty   BLOOD

    ALANABy sunrise, the estate no longer felt like the home I had grown up in.It felt like a mausoleum waiting for its next body.The halls were too quiet. The air too heavy. Every shadow felt like the shape of a threat. And everywhere I turned, I saw the same thing—fear disguised as discipline. Guards standing a little too straight. Advisors speaking a little too softly. Staff averting their eyes as if looking at me too long might curse them.But the strangest part wasn’t them.It was me.Because somewhere deep beneath my ribs, something cold had settled.Not dread.Not fear.Recognition.Like I’d known this moment was coming long before it arrived.I just didn’t know why.Not yet.⸻Zach hadn’t slept. I heard him pacing long before I opened my eyes. When I turned my head on the pillow, he was standing near the windows, shirtless, arms crossed, jaw clenched so tightly the muscle ticked. Dawn light cut across his back, tracing the scars I knew by heart.My protector.My weapon.My ruin

  • Whispers of Loyalty   DECLARATION

    ZACHThere’s a kind of silence that comes after a threat is made publicly.Not the silence of fear.Not the silence of strategy.The silence of a predator deciding which throat to rip out first.That silence settled over the estate after the card with the single letter—L—landed at Alana’s feet. Even hours later, after the power returned, after the guests fled, after the staff scurried through the halls pretending everything was fine, the air still vibrated with it.I felt it in the walls.In the floorboards.In the rhythm of Alana’s breathing beside me as we walked through the darkened hallway toward the war room.She had changed out of her dress, slipping into one of my shirts and a pair of leggings, her bare feet silent on the floor. Her hair was still pinned up from the event, wisps falling against her neck.She looked like war disguised as softness.And I wanted to throw her over my shoulder and lock her in our room where nothing could reach her.Where nothing could touch her.Whe

  • Whispers of Loyalty   POISED

    ALANAThe celebration was never meant to feel like a celebration.Not really.It was supposed to be a victory—our victory.Leone was gone. A major enemy eliminated. The estate was secure again, or at least that’s what everyone whispered to one another like they needed the lie to breathe.But every step down the grand staircase felt like descending into a room waiting to swallow me whole.The chandelier glowed too brightly, a thousand crystals catching the light like shattered glass suspended in the air. The murmur of voices swelled beneath it—soldiers, advisors, allies from old bloodlines I only half trusted. Their laughter felt brittle. Their smiles felt forced.And through all of it, Zach’s hand wrapped around mine.Grounding.Possessive.Warm.But even with his fingers locked between mine, his body was tense—every muscle on alert, his gaze tracking every unfamiliar movement in the room. He wasn’t celebrating.He was hunting.Gia intercepted us halfway down with a glass already in h

  • Whispers of Loyalty   DEVOTION

    ZACHThere’s a moment after every major kill where the world feels a little too sharp.Too bright.Too alive.That moment usually fades.This time, it didn’t.Two days after we ended Leone, everything still felt wrong.Too still.Too controlled.Too easy.Like the universe was sucking in breath and holding it—waiting for the next move.I woke before dawn in the one place that should’ve felt safe: our room, Alana curled against my chest, her breaths warm and steady.And yet the first thing I felt wasn’t peace.It was the creeping sense that someone was watching us.Someone inside these walls.Someone waiting.My hand drifted toward the knife under my pillow out of instinct.Alana stirred, half-asleep, and pressed her face into my chest. I held her tighter, breathing in the scent of her hair, grounding myself in the one thing that still felt real.But the feeling didn’t fade.I slid out from under her quietly, careful not to wake her. She needed the sleep. She hadn’t gotten more than a

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