For Kathryn ”Casey” Collins, that somewhere was the chillier side of the Iron Curtain one January night in 1986.
On a deserted highway in rural Poland, her VW slams into a wild boar. He's road kill, she's stuck in a ditch, and the temperature's headed down, down, down. To keep them both from freezing to death, the 27-year-old career diplomat cajoles Matt, her Marine guard passenger, into a double sleeping bag and climbs in after him. A night of whispered secrets and unplanned warmth propels Casey into an accidental relationship with fateful consequences.
When she messes with a horny Marine five years her junior, she raises eyebrows in the Warsaw embassy. When young Matt dumps her to fall into a honeytrap set by the Polish clone of the KGB, he risks a prison sentence for treason. Foreign agent Stefan Krajewski is suddenly on her doorstep, offering to rescue the lad. What does he want from Casey in return?
Expanded and retitled since first published in 1996, "Warm Bodies in a Cold War" brings Casey to the threshold of a sinister labyrinth of seduction, betrayal and terror. Included with the short story is the first chapter of "No Place for an Honest Woman", in which Casey is drawn unwillingly into the field to begin the counterterrorist crusade continued in "12 Drummers Drumming", "Night on Fire" and "East Past Warsaw".
For Kathryn ”Casey” Collins, that somewhere was the chillier side of the Iron Curtain one January night in 1986.
On a deserted highway in rural Poland, her VW slams into a wild boar. He's road kill, she's stuck in a ditch, and the temperature's headed down, down, down. To keep them both from freezing to death, the 27-year-old career diplomat cajoles Matt, her Marine guard passenger, into a double sleeping bag and climbs in after him. A night of whispered secrets and unplanned warmth propels Casey into an accidental relationship with fateful consequences.
When she messes with a horny Marine five years her junior, she raises eyebrows in the Warsaw embassy. When young Matt dumps her to fall into a honeytrap set by the Polish clone of the KGB, he risks a prison sentence for treason. Foreign agent Stefan Krajewski is suddenly on her doorstep, offering to rescue the lad. What does he want from Casey in return?
Expanded and retitled since first published in 1996, "Warm Bodies in a Cold War" brings Casey to the threshold of a sinister labyrinth of seduction, betrayal and terror. Included with the short story is the first chapter of "No Place for an Honest Woman", in which Casey is drawn unwillingly into the field to begin the counterterrorist crusade continued in "12 Drummers Drumming", "Night on Fire" and "East Past Warsaw".