The CEO’S Unplanned Heir novel (Aurelia and Leopold) novel Chapter 1284

He and Leopold hauled Raines inside, easing him down onto the couch. His eyes were wide open, unblinking, seemingly lost in some sort of trance that was quite unsettling.

Beverley shivered as she glanced over, "Should we try waking Raines up?"

"I heard it's dangerous to wake a sleepwalker, and they could drop dead from shock," Nina said.

"But what if he's stuck in a nightmare and can't snap out of it? Waking him might actually do him some good," William chimed in.

Skyler stood pensive at a distance, "It's possible he's been hypnotized."

He squatted down, whispering into Raines' ear, "I'll count to three, and you'll wake up. One, two, three."

With a snap of his fingers, Raines' eyes closed and then slowly opened, as if his soul had been returned to his body. Seeing everyone around him, he started, "What are you all doing here? Is it morning already?"

Beverley and Leopold exchanged a look, "Raines, you're in the study, not your bedroom. You’ve been hypnotized, took a little nocturnal stroll from your room's balcony to here."

"What?" A shudder ran through Raines' whole body.

Skyler was seething, "It has to be Geoffrey's doing. This is way out of line."

Raines cradled his head, a slight pain throbbing.

"Don't worry, Raines. I'll help you break the hypnosis. Just try not to think about anything right now and go back to sleep," Skyler said, patting his shoulder.

"Okay." Raines nodded and left the study for his own room. Lately, he'd been having memory gaps. Could it be that it wasn't his amnesia worsening, but that he'd been hypnotized without knowing what he was actually doing?

Back in the study, Leopold advised everyone to head to their own rooms to get some rest, it was late, and any issues could wait until the morning.

When he returned to his room, Aurelia had already taken a short nap and was just waking up.

"Where have you been?"

"It's just Liam's ghost. Nothing to fear," Nina assured her.

"You didn't see him. His smile is creepy, really," Mira insisted, "Regardless, he's still a ghost."

"He'll probably go bother Uncle Leopold, Aunt Aurelia, or Kane. Doubt he'll come back for us," Nina tried to reassure her, though she too felt a chill.

"I bet he loves playing hide and seek," Mira speculated.

"Yeah," Nina nodded, "That’s why he showed up when we were playing. He never appears otherwise. Do ghosts look any different from the living?"

Mira pondered for a moment before replying, "They look exactly the same, just popping in and out of view, disappearing in the blink of an eye."

"They're probably just going invisible, not wanting to be seen. I've heard if you have a camera, you might catch a clear glimpse of them," Nina remarked, recalling the horror movies she'd secretly watched as a kid.