On her fourth day in the White House press office, President Kennedy’s special assistant Dave Powers asked Alford if she would like to join a group in the residence's swimming pool, where to her surprise they were joined by President Kennedy. Asked to join a drinks party in the residence that evening, the President offered her a personal tour of the property, and after showing her into Jackie Kennedy's powder blue bedroom, she and Kennedy had sex, which was Alford's first sexual encounter.[5] The resultant affair lasted 18 months, during which Alford and the President had regular trysts.[6] Alford says they did not have sexual relations after August 1963, though she retained her position in the White House.[7] She would have been in Dallas, Texas with Kennedy on November 22, 1963, but that weekend she was with her parents and the parents of her fiance, Tony Fahnestock, in Connecticut arranging their forthcoming wedding; President Kennedy had already given her a $300 wedding gift