Fortunately, he didn’t have to follow through on his threat because, thirty seconds later, the gates swung open. After a brief conversation with a Secret Service agent, he drove along the curving lane that cut through the heavily wooded property to the house, a large brick Georgian. He parked in front and got out. The chilly air carried the smell of fall leaves, and the clear morning sky promised sunshine, which he tried to convince himself was a good omen. Not an easy task when he felt sick to his stomach.

The front door opened, and there she was. His stomach jumped to his throat. Everything that had been murky to him was now crystal clear, but obviously not to her … Instead of inviting him in, she came outside, a black windbreaker tossed on over bright red pajamas printed with green bullfrogs.

The last people he wanted to face right now were her parents, so having this showdown outside was an unexpected gift. She’d shoved her bare feet into a pair of sneakers, and her hair was a beautiful, shiny light-brown rumpus. She wore no makeup, and a sleep-crease marked her cheek. She looked pretty, ordinary. Extraordinary.

She stopped between a pair of pillars at the top of three wide steps. He walked toward her along the brick sidewalk. “Who died?” she said, taking in his suit.

She had to know he wouldn’t show up at the home of the president of the United States in jeans and a T-shirt. “No time to change.”

She came down off the steps and into the crimson and yellow leaves scattered along the walk. Despite her small features and the frog pajamas, she didn’t look anything like a teenager. She was a fully grown woman—alluring, complicated, and angry, all of which scared the hell out of him.

She jutted her jaw at him as belligerently as a prizefighter. “There’s a big difference between having a vasectomy and planning to have a vasectomy.”

“What do you mean? I never said I’d already had one.”

She blew that off. “I’m not arguing with you about it.” She tromped onto the damp, leaf-covered grass, moving in the direction of a tree that looked like it could have sheltered Thomas Jefferson while he proofread the Declaration of Independence. “The fact is,” she said, “somewhere along the line one of your little buggers hit a home run, and now you’re going to be a father. What do you think about that?”

“I-I haven’t had time to think.”

“Well, I have, and I’ll tell you what’s not going to happen. I’m not pretending I went to a sperm bank, and I’m not getting rid of this baby.”

He was horrified. “You sure as hell aren’t.”

She went on, still highly pissed. “So what are you going to do about it? Crack up again?”