Love, Lipstick and Lies (3 page)

I ended up leaving the ball before him and he travelled home later with two of my friends. Diana does the publicity for my books, and Gary has been my makeup artist for years. They thought he was behaving really oddly and couldn’t talk to him at all. Apparently they heard a funny noise coming from the back seat where he was sitting and were shocked to find him doing something of a sexual nature in the taxi, completely oblivious to them being there. I know! When they told me back at the house, I think I underplayed it, explained it away as him being drunk. It was only later as I was having serious concerns about Alex that I thought back to what they had told me, and how early on it had revealed the seedy, disturbing side of his cross-dressing.

A whirlwind three months after we had met, Alex proposed to me and I said yes. I still thought that his cross-dressing was something that I was in control of and, as I’ve said, it rarely happened before we were married in 2010. But even without Roxanne we had problems …

In November 2009 I appeared for the second time on
I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!
I had agreed to go on the reality show again because I wanted people to see that I was a completely different woman from the heartless bitch the press had portrayed me as for the past six months. The first time I had gone on the show in 2004 I’m sure many people thought that I was just a glamour-girl bimbo, who got her tits out for a living, and spent all her time plastered in make up, falling pissed
out of night clubs. But they changed their opinion when they saw what I was like in the jungle. I’d like to think that they saw the real me then; that I came across as down-to-earth, ready to take on any of the challenges, however disgusting and frightening; and that I was a woman capable of falling deeply in love.

But the second trip to the jungle was not a positive experience for me. I hope I showed the real me again, but I felt powerless to reverse the negative coverage of me in the press. The public voted for me to do every single bush-tucker trial, and it did get to me. It felt as if the viewers really wanted to give me a bad time, that they actually enjoyed seeing me scared and vulnerable.

It was the tasks involving water that terrified me the most as I’ve had a fear of being out of my depth ever since I was a teenager and had a panic attack while I was swimming and actually thought I was going to drown. Heights terrify me as well. Somehow I endured the tasks involving water, though I had a panic attack after one of these and had to say the words ‘I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!’ in order to be rescued. I made it through the Hell Hole Challenge, which involved climbing a sixty-foot wall and sticking my hand into holes where there were spiders, snakes and rats. I put my face into a tank full of slime and stinking mealworm larvae to collect the stars with my teeth; I had thousands of cockroaches poured on to my head and into my jacket and boots; I did all the disgusting eating tasks, munching on grubs and cockroaches, though I spat
out the fish eye and drew the line at chewing down a kangaroo’s testicle!

I felt drained by these daily ordeals, as if the public were bent on torturing and punishing me. Of course I’d expected to do some bush-tucker trials when I went in, but had never imagined it would be so relentless. By the time I was voted to do the seventh trial in a row I couldn’t take any more. I walked off the show. I’m usually up for anything but I don’t think I was physically or mentally prepared for doing so many gruelling tasks on top of a year where my marriage had ended and I’d endured such a public mauling by the press.

I was looking forward to being reunited with Alex in Australia and my kids in the UK. I certainly needed one of Alex’s cuddles after what I’d been through. But he wasn’t there to meet me. Instead I was met by my good friend Michelle Heaton, who told me that it appeared Alex had been selling stories while I was away and, to cap it all, there had been a front-page story in one tabloid that he was flying out to Australia to propose to me. I had told Alex categorically that I didn’t want him to talk about me in the press, that we would be finished if he ever did. I felt as if he had completely betrayed my trust. On top of everything else …
this
. I didn’t know how much more I could take.

‘We’re over,’ I told him on the phone. I didn’t want to hear anything he had to say; I was so angry and hurt. When I was interviewed by Ant and Dec on ITV, I told them that Alex and I were no longer together. But later
I agreed to meet up with him. Alex denied selling any stories, talked me round, and charmed me. I wanted to believe him; I thought I loved him. I didn’t want our relationship to be over so I accepted his explanation. No one around me believed him, though. They all thought I was crazy to take him back. I know what I’m like, and when I’m in a relationship I want it to work; I try my hardest to make it work. I always want to believe in that fairy-tale, happy-ever-after ending, and when there are problems I try and find excuses for situations. And when there’s been a problem, afterwards I think, Oh, it’s all right now. Things will get better. That’s definitely what I thought back then with Alex. Things will get better. And they did for a while … for a few months after that we had great times.

* * *

Although I had made it clear from the start with Alex that I didn’t want a relationship with someone in the public eye, he kept pushing me, saying he wanted to do an interview or go on such and such a show. As much as I didn’t want him to, I knew I couldn’t stop him. I warned him that if he started doing interviews with the press then they would be on his case even more than they already were. But then he was offered the chance to appear on
Celebrity Big Brother.
The press had written so much rubbish about our relationship, and about us, that I thought it would be good for the public to see what Alex was really like. I knew that he wouldn’t
dress up as Roxanne on-screen and thought that he would come across really well. So my management negotiated a good deal for him to appear on the show – around a hundred and fifty grand.

Sure enough, Alex impressed everyone with his appearance. He came across as a genuinely lovely guy. Everyone on the show got on with him, and the public obviously liked him because they voted for him to win – the same public who had booed him when he had gone into the house. I missed him so much it was ridiculous! I pined for him so badly, I would be glued to the TV in the evenings and couldn’t go to sleep until I knew he was tucked up in bed. I realised then that I definitely wanted to marry him, and as soon as I possibly could.

When he came out of the house he was greeted by a cheering crowd. ‘I’m a man in love!’ he told them. ‘I love Katie Price!’ The cheers changed to boos when he mentioned my name, the press had done such a good job of making me out to be a bitch, but Alex stood up for me, told them to stop because they didn’t know me. I was really touched by his support – my fighter, fighting for me. I’d already had the ordeal of being booed at the National Television Awards earlier that month, and however brave a face you put on, it’s a deeply horrible experience. I’d love to know why the people who booed thought it was okay to do that to someone they didn’t even know. It was just like being bullied at school. And as Alex said, these people didn’t even know me. Whenever I meet new people they always say that I’m
very different from the way they expect; usually they comment on how down-to-earth and nice I am, after the press have made me out to be a heartless, publicity-seeking cow.

A few days after Alex was crowned the winner of
Celebrity Big Brother
we flew to Las Vegas and got married. It was a real spur-of-the-moment decision, and it felt really romantic and special. I was excited about our future together. The photographs of the wedding were lovely; we looked so happy together.

Now that we were married the time felt right for me to have another baby. We had been trying for several months, in fact, and I was starting to feel concerned that I hadn’t become pregnant yet. At that time, I still had no idea how significant a part his cross-dressing and wanting sex as Roxanne played in Alex’s life. The year before, I’d suffered a miscarriage, which as any woman knows who’s been through one is heartbreaking. I kept worrying that there might be something wrong with me as I hadn’t fallen pregnant since, though I’d never had a problem conceiving before. By April I was so worried that we sought medical advice.

After we’d both had a series of tests it was decided that we needed fertility treatment, something called ICSI. It’s used where a man has a low sperm count or where the sperm have low motility (are poor swimmers). Basically the best sperm are selected and then injected into the egg. I would have to take hormones to stimulate egg production, and that meant that I would have to
give myself daily injections and would have to inject myself in the stomach. I have a life-long phobia of needles and, while I can inject my son Harvey with the daily growth-hormone drugs he needs with no problem at all, I absolutely hate being injected myself. I don’t think Alex quite understood how I felt and what a big deal this was to me. But I put that down to him being a man. I don’t think many of them understand the emotions women experience when they are trying to get pregnant, or even while the pregnancy is progressing. The significance of it all doesn’t seem to hit most men until they are presented with a real-life baby.

* * *

A week or so later we went to Egypt on holiday, along with my friend Polly and her husband Andrew, who was also my riding instructor, my son Harvey, and Polly and Andrew’s two children. I had been good friends with the couple (and I still am) since I decided that I wanted to take up dressage in 2008, and we had stayed friends throughout my traumatic break up with Pete, when the newspapers were full of speculation about why my marriage had broken up, and were persistently trying to link me to Andrew. They had tracked him and Polly down in Spain where they were on holiday, and contacted Polly’s friends on Facebook and tried to dig up dirt on the two of them, and on me, but of course there was nothing to find out.

The doctor thought that our Egypt trip in April was
perfect timing as then we would be relaxed during the treatment to follow. As things turned out, that wasn’t the case. This was partly due to the volcano erupting in Iceland that caused all flights to be grounded, which resulted in me getting back late for the next stage of my treatment. Anyone who has ever had fertility treatment will appreciate exactly how stressed I was about the delay. If we didn’t get back by a certain date then we would have to stop that course of treatment and start again in two months’ time. Not only is it a very emotional thing to undertake, it’s also very expensive, and I was paying for the treatment. Alex didn’t pay for any of it.

And, as if an unexpected volcanic eruption wasn’t enough of a problem, there were other things that were starting to worry me. It was in Egypt that Alex’s obsession with training started to grate on me. I appreciated how committed he was to his sport, but he went to the gym every single morning. I did think he could have eased off a little as this was supposed to be a holiday. I felt it was fortunate that I had Polly and Andrew with me otherwise I could have been pretty lonely.

Worse was to come. One day we were all having lunch when out of the blue he asked, ‘So how much are you worth then?’

WTF! Why was he asking me this?

For a minute I didn’t think I could have heard him right, it was so unexpected and so inappropriate.

‘Go on then, tell me, how much are you worth?’

No one I had ever had a relationship with before had asked me this question, not even Pete and we had been together for five years.

I looked over at Andrew and Polly, who seemed to be as shocked as I felt.

I took a deep breath and replied, ‘That’s my business. I’m not telling you.’

Alex frowned, and looked pissed off. ‘Yeah, but I’m your husband, you should be able to tell me. You
should
tell me.’

I shook my head. ‘Well, I’m not going to.’

‘I can’t believe you won’t tell me! Come on, I know the Beckhams are worth millions. So what are you worth?’

God! Didn’t he get the message? ‘I’m not telling you, and I’m not discussing this any further.’ I thought that would be the end of it, but when we went back to our suite Alex was sulky and said, ‘I find it really offensive that you won’t tell me.’

He
found it offensive!

‘Look, even Pete didn’t ask me that. I don’t want to talk about it. It shouldn’t matter anyway. I thought you were with me because of me, not because of how much money I have?’

But he wouldn’t let it drop. ‘If we’re together, we should know everything about each other. We shouldn’t have any secrets. I’m really pissed off that you won’t share this with me.’

We had only been married three months and maybe it was because we were newly married that he thought
he should know everything, but I felt annoyed that he should ask this and expect to be told. I’ve never asked any of the men I’ve been with about how much money they have, including Alex. When I met him it didn’t concern me that he didn’t have any money because I fell for him, not his bank balance. And just as well as there was bugger all in it!

I would never dream of asking anyone that question. Why should it matter? I think it’s downright rude. I’ve often been asked how much money I earn in press interviews, and have never discussed it; it’s no one’s business but mine.

I pushed this disagreement to the back of my mind but it did start off a niggle of doubt about whether I had done the right thing in marrying Alex so quickly, and about his true motives for marrying me. I’d thought it was for love. But were my friends right? Was it all about the money for him? I tried to tell myself that it couldn’t be. He had signed a pre-nup just before we got married in Vegas, and had always said he didn’t want any of my money.

But a similar thing was to happen later in the year when we invited friends round to the house for a barbecue. We were all in the back garden, enjoying ourselves, when Alex started acting almost as if he was lord of the manor, pointing out the boundaries.