Riko is the son of an American father and Russian mother who settled in apartheid South Africa. Blind to apartheid racial prejudices, he falls in love with Nomvula from childhood. Caught out in this forbidden relationship as a pre-1990s army careerist, following in the footsteps of his father, Riko is arrested by military police and faces severe consequences. Escape is the only solution, and his father's US army contacts are only too keen to assist and he finds himself joining the US Special Forces. Given his cosmopolitan parentage and linguistic endowments, he is immediately deployed as an American-USSR "cold war" double agent. Charged with top secret knowledge of both sides' nuclear weapons systems, he is like a walking timebomb himself. Initially thrust apart by apartheid racial policies, the fall of apartheid enables their reunification. As this comes tantalizingly close, an unexpected, ghoulish figure from Riko's past rises to thwart their fulfilment, where Nomvula is abducted and Riko is challenged to travel across the world to a rendezvous where he must trade his knowledge for her freedom. This is the ultimate test of their love, where his perfect love may require that he pay the ultimate price; and betrayal, he will discover, is all-too easy.