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God, you’re soaked. You must be freezing,” he said with concern. “I’ll have you taken to your quarters so you can change out of those wet things immediately.”
    “Yeah, well. That could be a problem,” she murmured, just as the man who’d escorted her on board stepped forward and spoke to him in rapid Russian accompanied by much gesturing.
    For a second Nikolai looked taken aback. “He dropped your suitcase?”
    She nodded. “It was me or it. He made the right choice.”
    Without taking his eyes off her, Nikolai spoke to her escort in Russian. The man’s expression froze and his gaze darted to her, then back to his commander. A young officer standing next to them scowled and said something to Nikolai in staccato Russian. Nikolai responded coolly to the officer, then snapped another order at her escort, who came to attention and said, “Da, Kapitan.”
    Nikolai gestured him over to Julie. “This is the boat’s quartermaster, Kvartirmyeister Misha Kresney. He will show you to your quarters and find you a hair dryer. No doubt one of the lady scientists has brought one along. I’m afraid that’s the best I can do at the moment. We are running behind schedule and must get under way. When we’re clear of the bay, I’ll attend to this matter.”
    “Thank you,” she said, grateful for his impersonal demeanor, and for his promise of help.
    “And we can continue our other discussion,” he added in a low voice for her ears only.
    So much for impersonal .
    Before she could set him straight, Romanov touched the brim of his uniform hat, turned, and strode away. He disappeared through a narrow opening in the seemingly solid maze of hanging pipes and crowded instrument panels that filled nearly every square inch of the claustrophobic space. It was as though the escape hatch ladder had deposited her in a closet cluttered with the debris of a hundred years.
    Escape . Now there was a good idea. She gazed up at the hatch and thought longingly of her pristine desk back at Langley.
    A half second later Nikolai’s head reappeared amid the pipes. He gave one more unintelligible order to Kvartirmyeister Kresney, then vanished again, this time for good.
    For a brief moment she really wished she spoke Russian. Understanding the enemy always gave one an advantage. In The Art of War , the ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu said, “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” She was fluent in three other languages. How hard would it be to learn one more? Then again, no way did she want those words in her head. She wanted nothing to do with the country that had killed her father. Not its language. Not its secrets. And certainly not one of its navy captains . . . no matter how sexy or awesome a kisser he was. Thank goodness she’d had the sense and fortitude to turn him down last night.
    Sun Tzu had also said, “Do not swallow bait offered by the enemy.”
    No damn kidding.
    Already this mission was turning into a battle—of knowledge, of wits, of temptation. The lines had been clearly drawn between her and the attractive Russian navy captain. She just hoped to God she could keep up her resistance to him. Because as bait went, Captain Nikolai Kirillovich Romanov was far too enticing—and far too dangerous.

3

    Julie followed Kresney’s stout, compact form into the same narrow passageway where Nikolai had vanished. The quartermaster slipped easily through a round opening that punctuated the end of the passage. She’d seen enough World War II movies to know this was one of the watertight doors that sealed off one compartment from the next in case of flooding. Or sinking .
    The door was wide open, but seeing it was a rude reminder she was now several meters underwater, two thin, rusting husks of metal the only thing separating her from certain death.
    Her chest squeezed, and she had to grab the hard edge of the watertight door to keep from sprinting back to the exit ladder and