The incongruous couple raised red flags, according to journalist Christo Grozev, a Bulgarian journalist with investigative outlet Bellingcat.

“It took me about five minutes to discover that the pilot’s ‘lover’ (waaay too hot for him, FSB) was an FSB asset,” Grozev wrote on Twitter, using the acronym for Russia’s Federal Security Service.

“The Ukrainians figured that out too,” he added.

Grozev said he’d been following a team of Ukrainian “maverick ex-operatives” running an unofficial operation trying to get Russian pilots to defect.