A Secret Affair

Vanessa surveyed the living room of the cottage through newly…

Chapter Ten

Bill had asked Vanessa to meet him at Tavern On…

Chapter Eleven

It had been raining all afternoon, hard, driving rain that…

Chapter Twelve

Are you sure there are no messages for me?” Vanessa…

Chapter Thirteen

Over the years, I’ve discovered that the more you love…

Chapter Fourteen

You were there, Joe! What really happened?” Frank Peterson exclaimed…

Chapter Fifteen

Vanessa sat up with a jerk, feeling disoriented, blinking as…

Chapter Sixteen

I’m glad Alice listened to you, Dru, and took her…

Chapter Seventeen

On Friday morning Drucilla Fitzgerald was released from Southampton Hospital.

About the Author

Other Books by Barbara Taylor Bradford

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

Sarajevo, August 1995

He was closing the small padlock on his duffle bag when a deafening explosion brought his head up swiftly. He listened acutely, with accustomed practice, fully expecting to hear another bomb exploding. But there was nothing. Only silence.

Bill Fitzgerald, chief foreign correspondent for CNS, the American cable news network, put on his flak jacket and rushed out of the room.

Tearing down the stairs and into the large atrium, he crossed it and left the Holiday Inn through a back door. The front entrance, which faced Sniper Alley, as it was called, had not been used since the beginning of the war. It was too dangerous.

Glancing up, Bill’s eyes scanned the sky. It was a soft, cerulean blue, filled with recumbent white clouds but otherwise empty. There were no warplanes in sight.

An armored Land Rover came barreling down the street where he was standing and skidded to a stop next to him.

The driver was a British journalist, Geoffrey Jackson, an old friend, who worked for the Daily Mail. “The explosion came from over there,” Geoffrey said. “That direction.” He gestured ahead, and asked, “Want a lift?”

“Sure do, thanks, Geoff,” Bill replied and hopped into the Land Rover.

As they raced along the street, Bill wondered what had caused the explosion, then said aloud to Geoffrey, “It was more than likely a bomb lobbed into Sarajevo by the Serbs in the hills, don’t you think?”

“Absolutely,” Geoffrey agreed. “They’re well entrenched up there, and let’s face it, they never stop attacking the city. The way they are sniping at civilians is getting to me. I don’t want to die from a stray rifle shot covering this bloody war.”

“Me neither.”

“Where’s your crew?” Geoffrey asked as he drove on, peering through the windscreen intently, looking for signs of trouble, praying to avoid it.

“They went out earlier, to reconnoiter, while I was packing my bags. We’re supposed to leave Sarajevo today. For a week’s relaxation and rest in Italy.”

“Lucky sods!” Geoffrey laughed. “Can I carry your bags?”

Bill laughed with him. “Sure, come with us, why don’t you?”

“If only, mate, if only.”

A few minutes later Geoffrey was pulling up near an open marketplace. “This is where the damn thing fell,” the British journalist said, his jolly face suddenly turning grim. “Bleeding Serbs, won’t they ever stop killing Bosnian civilians? They’re fucking gangsters, that’s all they are.”

“You know. I know. Every journalist in the Balkans knows. But does the Western alliance know?”

“Bunch of idiots, if you ask me,” Geoffrey answered and parked the Land Rover. He and Bill jumped out.

“Thanks for the ride,” Bill said. “See you later. I’ve got to find my crew.”

“Yeah. See you, Bill.” Geoffrey disappeared into the mêlée.

Bill followed him.

Chaos reigned.

Women and children were running amok; fires burned everywhere. He was assaulted by a cacophony of sounds…loud rumblings as several buildings disintegrated into piles of rubble; the screams of terrified women and children; the moans of the wounded and the dying; the keening of mothers hunched over their children, who lay dead in the marketplace.

Bill clambered over the half-demolished wall of a house and jumped down into another area of the marketplace. Glancing around, his heart tightened at the human carnage. It was horrific.

He had covered the war in the Balkans for a long time, on and off for almost three years now; it was brutal, a savage war, and still he did not understand why America turned the other cheek, behaved as if it were not happening. That was something quite incomprehensible to him.

A cold chill swept through him, and his step faltered for a moment as he walked past a young woman sobbing and cradling her lifeless child in her arms, the child’s blood spilling onto the dark earth.

He closed his eyes for a split second, steadied himself before walking on. He was a foreign correspondent and a war correspondent, and it was his job to bring the news to the people. He could not permit emotion to get in the way of his reporting or his judgment; he could never become involved with the events he was covering. He had to be impartial. But sometimes, goddamnit, he couldn’t help getting involved. It got to him occasionally…the pain, the human suffering. And it was always the innocent who were the most hurt.

As he moved around the perimeter of the marketplace, his eyes took in everything…the burning buildings, the destruction, the weary, defeated people, the wounded. He shuddered, then coughed. The air was foul, filled with thick black smoke, the smell of burning rubber, the stench of death. He drew to a halt, and his eyes swept the area yet again, looking for his crew. He was certain they had heard the explosion and were now here. They had to be somewhere in the crowd.