As they pass Constitution Gardens, the illuminated obelisk of the Washington Monument looms into view on the right. Behind them, the Suburban is already merging back into traffic on Constitution Avenue to join the other armored vehicles circling the Mall for his protection.

Cole looks like your average middle-aged guy out running with his daughter or his personal trainer, but it’s all choreographed. No one sees the carefully positioned special agents among the pedestrians on the Mall and the sniper teams on the roof of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and the National Gallery. Four miles away, at Reagan National Airport, a pair of helicopters—one carrying trauma doctors and nurses, the other filled with heavily armed members of the Secret Service counterassault team—are poised and ready to take off and fly to the Mall.

In the very first days of Maddy’s term, Cole had pushed back hard about Secret Service protocols around his evening exercise. “I can walk to the Mall and back in thirty minutes!” he argued, adding that Harry Truman took daily walks outside the White House.

No way, the Secret Service supervisor, mindful of cell phones, tracking software, and terrorists, had told him. Too open, too vulnerable, no quick means of escape. “Sir, you can run any route you want—with our transport and protection.”

Now Cole picks up the pace. Despite the January chill, he’s starting to sweat a little under his blue windbreaker, and it feels good.

Here and there, people point and whisper. Others hold up their cell phones. Cole nods if somebody waves to him, but he never draws attention by waving back.

As he runs, Cole brushes a round embroidered patch on the front of his windbreaker. It has the seal of the United States with six stars, and the lettering around it reads PRESIDENT’S COUNCIL ON PHYSICAL FITNESS. It’s vintage, more than sixty years old, from the JFK era.

In the early days of Maddy’s presidency, Cole had struggled to identify his role. He’d spent hours with Burton Pearce, his onetime college housemate and now the president’s chief of staff, trying to determine where he should put his focus.

Cole was clear on one point. “Burton, I want a job.”

Burton chuckled. “See all these folders on my desk? Every single one represents a congressperson or senator who says they were mistaken in opposing your wife for president. They’re apologizing and making nice because they want jobs in her administration—and jobs for their assorted nieces and nephews. And I’m going to take great pleasure in telling them no.”

“Nicely, of course,” Cole said. “Now back to me.”

Pearce sighed. “You, Cole, already have a full-time job. First Gentleman.”

“That’s not a job,” said Cole.