Alexander Golovin is a respected, middle-aged Russian academic and currently a special advisor to the Russian Foreign Minister for the duration of the arms reduction talks with the Americans ongoing in beautiful Vienna, Austria. He is unhappily married, has a liberal-minded daughter who dislikes him for being part of the ever more repressive Putin government and he has a mistress half his age back in Moscow with whom he'd like to spend the rest of his life. He's also being blackmailed by the Russian Ministry of Defense to make sure that his views and recommendations match those of the Army's hardliners. He sees no way out of his unhappy situation until he meets a young CIA officer in Vienna and Golovin thinks he has found a solution to his problems - but has he? He starts down a lonely path of espionage, which proves to be much more complicated than he'd originally thought it would be. This is the realistic story of espionage from the perspective of the Russian agent, who has no diplomatic immunity if caught and has to deal with the psychological pressures and fears of being a spy all by himself. His is not the glamorous life of a James Bond. It's that of a scared man who must deceive everyone around him, as he deals with unexpected challenges in trying to come out of the Great Game alive, and do what is right for those around him.