Molly Keatley is deeply contented with her life, her loving husband, her comfortable home in an attractive London suburb. Things are so pleasant, in fact, that they're ever so slightly boring, but that changes abruptly one bright September morning, when her husband comes rushing home, mutters a hasty, unexplained apology . . . and disappears. Minutes later, two strange men arrive with news that her husband is in fact a Soviet spy, and that the sleepy joys of her marriage have acted as a cover for years of personal and public betrayal.

Her husband, it appears, has spent nearly a decade using her for his own purposes, and now the British intelligence service want to use her for theirs. It would be so easy to give in, to back away from the conspiracies and intrigues that suddenly loom in front of her. But the shock of Sam's betrayal has woken Molly out of her long, complacent dream, and she is no longer prepared to be anybody's pawn.