Secret Marriage: The CEO's Pampered Wife

She glared at Georgia Thorne, her eyes filled with bitter resentment.

Georgia Thorne stood up and finished her glass of juice in one go.

The others, seeing she was just a young girl fresh out of college, didn’t hold it against her.

Laura Chase’s sharp eyes spotted the wedding ring on Georgia Thorne’s finger. "Georgia, you’re married? That’s quite a nice wedding ring you’ve got!"

A shrill female voice rang out, and everyone’s gaze shifted to Georgia Thorne’s finger.

A plain, simple band sat on her finger; it was nothing special to look at.

Laura Chase had said it deliberately, wanting to put Georgia in the spotlight.

Georgia Thorne smiled and said calmly, "Yes, my husband and I got married right after graduation."

"Congratulations! You should bring your husband out for us to meet sometime. I want to see what kind of man could make you so devoted you’d marry him right after graduation," Laura Chase said with a beaming smile, though she didn’t mean a word of it.

’Georgia must have married some poor bastard. Why else would her wedding ring be so plain?’

"No, thanks. He doesn’t like meeting new people." ’Are you kidding me?’ she thought. ’If Elliot Sheridan showed up as my husband, everyone here would probably faint from shock.’

The topic of Georgia Thorne’s husband ended there. Georgia refused to say anything more about him.

Everyone lamented the fact that Georgia Thorne was already married, which only made them more curious about the man she had married.

Looking at Georgia Thorne now, no one present made the connection between her and Zane Lennox’s bride.

’Perhaps it was because I was wearing such heavy makeup that day that they didn’t recognize me,’ she thought.

Georgia Thorne breathed a sigh of relief. This was also why she had refused to appear on television before—she was afraid of being recognized.

The dinner banquet dragged on, showing no signs of ending even at nine o’clock.

Georgia Thorne kept her head down, focusing on her food. No more male colleagues came to chat her up, and she sat by herself in silence.

A little after nine, a call came from Elliot Sheridan. She answered it.

She grabbed her bag. "Um, something’s come up, so I’m going to head out!"

"Leaving so early?"

Georgia Thorne gave an apologetic smile and left the private room.

As she was leaving, Elliot Sheridan’s call came in again. While looking down and fumbling for her phone in her bag, she accidentally bumped into a waiter walking toward her.

The glass in the waiter’s hand tipped over, splashing water all over Georgia Thorne.

The waiter hurriedly apologized, "I’m so sorry, ma’am! I didn’t do it on purpose."

"It’s fine!" Georgia Thorne said, patting her clothes. ’It seems to be just plain water.’

The waiter picked up the glass from the floor and apologized again and again. "I’m truly sorry, ma’am."

Georgia Thorne looked at the waiter’s reddened eyes and felt as if she had committed some unforgivable crime.

Only after Georgia Thorne assured him multiple times that she was perfectly fine did the waiter finally breathe a sigh of relief.

Her phone, which had stopped ringing, started again. Georgia Thorne picked it up. "Honey, where are you?"

Elliot Sheridan had parked the car not far from the restaurant, but it still took Georgia Thorne a long time to find it.

Inside the car, the faint scent of alcohol hung in the air. Elliot Sheridan was sitting in his seat with his eyes shut tight.

Georgia Thorne got in. "Have you been drinking?"

"Not much."

He said "not much," but the strong smell of alcohol hit her as soon as he spoke.

The smell of alcohol in the car itself wasn’t heavy; he must have aired it out by opening the windows earlier.

"I keep telling you to drink less, so why did you have so much!" Georgia Thorne grumbled, but seeing the uncomfortable look on his face as he furrowed his brow, her heart softened. She pulled him closer, letting him rest his head on her shoulder.

’When men have business dinners, there are bound to be times they can’t get out of drinking.’

Back at the apartment, Owen Sawyer helped Elliot Sheridan to the bed.

"Ma’am, I’ll leave the President in your care."

"Okay. Be careful on your way back."

Georgia Thorne knelt and started taking off Elliot Sheridan’s clothes.

’And he said he didn’t drink much,’ she thought. ’He’s as drunk as a skunk.’

By the time she finished undressing him, she was covered in sweat and sat on the edge of the bed, panting.

She picked up the clothes she had taken off him and carried them into the bathroom.

Just as she was about to toss them in the hamper, a phone started ringing from inside his suit jacket.

The unfamiliar name "Genevieve Everett" appeared on the screen. The phone would ring, stop, then ring again.

Elliot Sheridan was impossible to wake. Worried it might be something important, Georgia Thorne answered the call.

A frantic voice on the other end said, "Elliot, when are you going to bring that little wife of yours over? If Aidan Sheridan’s situation drags on any longer, he’s going to die."

"Who is this?" Georgia Thorne asked, confused, a bad feeling creeping into her heart.

"You’re Georgia Thorne?... Damn it!"

After a moment’s pause, the person on the other end cursed under their breath and hung up.

’Aidan Sheridan,’ she recalled. ’If I remember correctly, that’s Elliot’s younger brother. The one who’s been in a coma for nearly seven or eight years.’

’What does that have to do with me?’

An awful premonition washed over Georgia Thorne, and she frantically called Selena Sheridan.

"Georgia? Why are you calling?"

"Selena, I have to ask you something. What’s wrong with Aidan?"

"You found out?" Selena Sheridan said, rubbing her eyes, her voice heavy with sleep. "My uncle woke up half a month ago, but..."

That one word—’but’—made the breath Georgia had just released catch in her throat. "But what?"

"The doctor said my uncle was in a coma for too long. His bodily functions have degenerated, especially his kidneys. He needs a kidney transplant. If they can’t find a suitable match, he’ll definitely die."

"A kidney transplant?"

"Yeah. But we’re not holding out much hope. We’ve been searching for a suitable kidney donor for seven or eight years without any luck. How could we possibly find one in just a few short months?"

"..."

Georgia Thorne tossed her phone aside, a sudden chill running through her for reasons she couldn’t explain.

’Why did that person on the phone say Aidan would die if I didn’t go to the hospital?’

An answer was bubbling just beneath the surface of her thoughts, but Georgia Thorne didn’t dare face the truth.

She was afraid that the truth she uncovered would be a bloody one.

Georgia Thorne didn’t sleep all night. The next morning, she went to the office early.

She wanted to run away for a while. Until she figured out how to face him, she didn’t want to see him at all.

Georgia Thorne arrived at the company early and sat zoned out at her desk.

After a while, more and more employees started trickling into the office.

Nathan Rhodes, seeing she wasn’t busy, walked over. "We’re going to set up for the design exhibition today. Why don’t you come with me?"

"Okay!"

「Setting up the exhibition venue—」

They were short-staffed, so everyone was busy.

Georgia Thorne stood on a ladder, holding the string of a banner. "Is this okay?"

"It’s crooked. A little higher."

"How about now?" Georgia Thorne moved it up a bit more and looked back down at the person below.

A staff member shook his head. "Still a bit higher."

Georgia Thorne was petite and had already stretched as high as she could. Any higher...

Georgia Thorne glanced up, shuffled her feet slightly to the side on the rung, and stretched her arm out. "Okay, how about this."

The staff member gave her an "OK" sign.

Georgia Thorne let out a sigh of relief and stood on her tiptoes to tie the banner’s string to a pillar.

"Make way, coming through! Watch out—"

Someone carrying a heavy box was walking past the ladder. Before they could finish their sentence, there was a dull THUD.

The corner of the box scraped against the ladder. Georgia Thorne, standing at the top, lost her balance and fell.

Georgia Thorne felt a heavy impact. A sharp pain shot through her lower abdomen, causing her to curl into a ball. Staff members rushed over. "Georgia, are you okay?"

Nathan Rhodes heard the commotion outside, dropped what he was doing, and ran out to see Georgia Thorne collapsed on the floor.

"What’s wrong with you people? How could you let a girl climb a ladder like that? Someone call an ambulance, now!"

Nathan Rhodes pushed through the crowd and hurried to her side. "Georgia, how are you?"

Georgia Thorne was in too much pain to speak. She could vaguely see Nathan Rhodes’s worried face swimming in her vision.

Then, her vision went black, and she passed out completely.

One of the staff members pointed at Georgia. "Blood! She’s bleeding!"

Nathan Rhodes panicked even more. He didn’t know where she was injured or why she would be bleeding.

A few minutes later, paramedics arrived. They expertly lifted the unconscious Georgia Thorne onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. Nathan Rhodes, his hands now covered in blood, told the paramedics, "I’m her friend," and got into the ambulance with them.

In the bustling hall, everyone was still trying to process what had just happened.

’She just fell from a ladder, but she’s bleeding and passed out? Just how weak is she?’

Nathan Rhodes tried his best to calm down and immediately called Byron Shaw.

"Byron, you need to get to the hospital! Something happened to Georgia!"

Byron Shaw was in the middle of a meeting. The moment he heard Georgia was in trouble, he immediately suspended the meeting and ran out.

Grace Wagner chased after him. "Attorney Shaw, where are you going?"

Byron Shaw was already gone.

Grace Wagner’s expression turned ugly. She thought she’d faintly heard a woman’s voice on the phone.

The ambulance had just arrived at the hospital when Byron Shaw pulled up right behind it.

Outside the operating room, Nathan Rhodes was pacing back and forth nervously, constantly glancing toward the entrance.

When he saw Byron Shaw arrive, he grabbed his sleeve as if he’d seen a savior. "It’s all my fault!"

"Has the doctor come out yet?"

Nathan Rhodes shook his head, his eyes welling with tears. Although Byron Shaw was worried about Georgia’s condition, seeing Nathan’s self-reproachful state, he softened his tone. "Don’t blame yourself too much. Just tell me what happened."

"Georgia is working at my company now. I took her to set up the exhibition today. I was only gone for a moment, and who knew someone would make her climb a ladder. Someone passing by accidentally knocked it over, and Georgia fell. It’s all my fault." The more Nathan spoke, the more the tears flowed. "She was bleeding."

’A fall, at worst, would just cause the old injury on Georgia’s leg to act up,’ Byron Shaw thought. ’There shouldn’t be any other problems.’

But when Nathan added that she was bleeding, Byron’s heart leaped back into his throat.

After a while, a doctor came out. "Who are you to the patient?"

"We’re her friends!"

"The patient is having a miscarriage and is bleeding uncontrollably. Is either of you type AB?"

Byron Shaw grabbed the doctor’s wrist. "What did you say? She’s having a miscarriage?"

"You didn’t know? The patient has been pregnant for over twenty days. A fetus is unstable in the early stages. After a fall from that height, the baby is definitely lost. Now, if we don’t get more blood, we might lose the mother, too!"