David Hopkins' job as a chemist in a multinational company based in London involves regular travel to Eastern Europe at the height of the Cold War. His business trips behind the "Iron Curtain" come to the attention of British Intelligence who dupe him into acting as a courier on their behalf. He is persuaded by the "spooks" to smuggle Anna, a beautiful and mysterious Russian to the West. They fall in love and secretly marry in England against the express orders of the Security Services. In hiding, to protect his wife from MI6 who have plans for her that will place her in peril, David learns that her father is in internal exile deep in Southern Russia and in mortal danger. Acting independently of the Intelligence community, who he does not trust, he resolves to smuggle him out to the West with the help of a motley crew, which includes his wife. A gripping life and death drama unfolds across Southern Russia and the Transcaucasian Soviet Socialist Republics as David heads for the Iranian border and safety.