It's 1968 and nineteen-year-old Elizabeth has had the perfect day: in love for the first time, a picnic in an orchard welcomed by Alec's beloved aunt in her cottage on the South Downs, hearing about how well her fiancé is doing in the Foreign Office. But as they speed back to Chelsea through the darkening countryside in his open top Jaguar, she knows something's wrong. He pulls over, and she feels her heart sink.

'You are never going to be an ambassador's wife,' he tells her.

But Alec isn't breaking off their engagement. He's telling her that he's not a diplomat. He's in the S.I.S – the Secret Intelligence Service. MI6. And if she marries him, so is she.

Elizabeth doesn't care who he works for: she loves him. Alec is posted to Cyprus and they start their married life together.But the danger and duplicity to come is far from anything Elizabeth could have imagined…



Liz Denchfield is the writing name for first cousins Juliet Clibborn and Angie Sage. Juliet, on whose life this novel is based, travelled the world with her 'diplomat' husband until his death in 2017. She lives in London and spends time at her home in southwest France. Angie is the bestselling author of the Septimus Heap, TodHunter Moon and Araminta Spook(ie) children's books, and lives in Cornwall.