Captivation Read Online Free PDF

shot takenby a friend of her mother’s as they wandered through the local village. Her mum had one arm resting casually across Juliette’s shoulders and was pointing at something out of view of the photo. Juliette was shading her eyes as she tried to see what her mother was pointing at. Danny and her father were walking behind them, their hands in their pockets and their heads thrown back as they laughed at some joke one or the other had told.
    Thinking of her mother made her remember how upset Eve had been with Juliette when she had made the decision to move permanently to Australia. She had started out on a backpacking holiday with friends, but Juliette had fallen in love with Sydney. Being so shy, she had never even entertained the possibility that she might one day move so far from her family. But the pull of creating a life all her own had been too strong. And when she met Danny, she had known she had made the right decision in moving to Sydney. Because if she hadn’t, then she wouldn’t have been jogging along the beach on that particular day, at that particular moment, and they never would have met.
    They met at Coogee, the very beach she could see each day from her balcony. Danny was jogging there as well. He’d been so bold, falling into step beside her, asking if she minded having a running partner, chatting effortlessly as he jogged. Within just half an hour he had convinced her to come out to dinner with him. From that first date onwards, they had barely spent a day apart. Getting engaged and then married was simply the most logical progression. They were perfect for one another, they slotted together seamlessly.
    Now, as the computer screen lit up, Juliette turned away from the photograph she’d been gazing at so avidly and blinked away tears. How could her life have changed so completely, so quickly? When that first heart attack had hit, what she remembered most of all was the sense of fear. At the time she couldn’t have ever imagined life without Danny. Five yearsthey’d been together – just five. Long enough to know so much about one another – but not nearly long enough to contemplate the thought of losing one another. She had rushed to find out anything and everything she could about heart disease. He was older than Juliette, but still young to have a heart attack. And he was so fit! It just made no sense. She needed to know exactly how to take care of him, how to ensure that he wouldn’t have another attack. The problem was, he was already healthy. He exercised a lot, he ate well.
    ‘It was just one of things,’ he kept telling her. ‘Don’t worry so much, it won’t happen again.’
    When the second heart attack hit him, he was in a hotel room in New York. He had convinced Juliette to stay behind in Australia for this trip, as it was only for two nights and she’d been sick with a bad cold.
    ‘The last thing you need is to be stuck on a plane for twenty hours,’ he’d said. ‘Stay here, get some rest and I’ll be home to look after you again before you know it.’
    The last thing she said before he left was, ‘Don’t go, stay. Stay here with me.’
    The call had come in from Danny’s agent. ‘I’m so sorry Juliette,’ she had begun. And the waver in her usually steely voice had made the words that followed redundant.
    Another heart attack. She had told him to stop travelling. To cancel his book tours. Known it would add extra stress to his body. He might have been healthy and fit, but with his heart condition he should have been taking things easy. He should have stayed home with Juliette.
    ‘Write your novels,’ she’d told him. ‘Publish your books – do what you love. But just stay here to do it. Stay here with me.’
    Hadn’t she been enough? Hadn’t their life been enough for him? Couldn’t they have gone on? He was all she ever needed. Danny was enough for her.She could have lived her life never making contact with another soul if it had meant that just she and