When Karina Kikorov falls deeply in love with her brilliant professor, Dimitri Globenko, she is shocked to discover that he is actually a Romanov, an estranged cousin of the Russian despot Czar Nicholas. Once she marries Dimitri, both of their lives are put in jeopardy. His eventual death leaves her a desperate widow.Waiting to find a safe way to emigrate to America, Karina unexpectedly finds a new life as well as a new love in Odessa, her retreat near the Black Sea. But does she have the strength to leave behind what she has grown to love most, and, despite that loss, to display enough strength and determination to ensure the safety of those whom she has vowed to protect as if they were her own?