FBI Special Agent Hunter McCrary hasn't appreciated anything Russian since a legendary KGB assassin known as Dark Swan killed his dad during the Cold War and left a black cloisonné swan pin at the crime scene. But when a hacker breaches the security of a government communications line, Hunter needs the computer expertise of the Dark Swan's American daughter, Lynzee Beryl, an MIT professor whose fascination with all things Russian stems from her lost childhood. He suspects the hacker is Lynzee's Russian ex-lover and hopes to use her as bait, but the spunky prof makes it hard to keep his mind on the job when she manages so effortlessly to slip past his defenses.

Lynzee doesn't know she's the Dark Swan's daughter, nor does she suspect the true significance of the black cloisonné swan pin that's been in her possession since she was orphaned at age four. She fears the dark shadows emerging from her forgotten past while she works to develop a "vaccine" against the computer virus. The style of the techno-terrorist bears an uncanny resemblance to that of the man she'd once loved in graduate school. She wants a G-man with Russkie issues in her life right now the way a vulnerable mainframe needs to be zapped by a logic bomb.

If Lynzee and Hunter could tell each other the truth, they might be able to put together the missing pieces of their childhood puzzles and realize they'd been destined to fall in love.