Former Big Brother star Imogen Thomas has spoken out about her affair Premiere League footballer former lover - and says she feels betrayed by him.
The 28-year-old model has revealed she rang him last week as details began to emerge of their relationship to plead that the story be kept quiet and he promised: 'I'll look after you.'
Instead, she was slapped with a High Court gagging order threatening her with jail if she named him.
Talking in today's Sunday Mirror, she said she felt 'betrayed' by the married footballer's behaviour.
She told the paper: 'I believed him when he said he would protect me but he’s only looked out for himself. My world has fallen apart.
'I can’t work because of the fuss so I don’t know how I’ll pay the mortgage, and I’ve been branded a homewrecker and a whore.
'But he hasn’t lost anything – he can go back to his big house, his wife and kids and still be worshipped when he plays football.'
Meanwhile, Thomas's friend claim he rang her yesterday to say he still has feelings for her and to beg her not to reveal his identity, say her friends.
The star gained a legal gagging order last week which prevented any newspapers from naming him.
But it is being claimed in today's papers that he called 28-year-old Thomas yesterday saying: 'If my name gets out I'll be divorced...and it will cost me millions.'
Rhe People says that the ace also confessed to still having feelings for the Welsh beauty following their six month affair and expressed his remorse that she'd been named as his mistress.
A source told the paper: 'He accepts she loves him and wanted to be with him. It would have been easy for her to make his life very difficult. He understands that. However, he begged he, "Please don't name me.'
Model Thomas is said to be 'devastated' that their relationship was revealed, effectively ending it.
She is said to have confided in a friend, saying: 'I believed it was true love and feel devastated...I wanted to settle down and have the whole marriage and kids thing with him.'
Thomas, who was in the 2006 series of Big Brother and was a beauty queen beforehand, is being comforted by her close friend Dancing On Ice star Elen Rivas, 35.
They became friends when Thomas was dating Jermain Defoe, 28, and Rivas was still with her former boyfriend, Chelsea footballer Frank Lampard.
Rivas said: 'I urged Imogen to dump him because I knew he would never leave his wife but Imogen always insisted he would.
'She was saying to people her lover told her he had never loved anyone as much as he did her. 'Thomas said she met the love rat in a London nightclub in September.
She claims he did all the running and pursued her by constantly calling and sending flirty texts and messages.
She told the Sunday Mirror: 'For the first few weeks I wouldn’t even put his number in my phone. I liked him but I had to pull myself away.
'I called it off a million times but he kept coming back. He knew it was wrong as well, he said as much, but he was pursuing me.'
'We didn’t want it to go any further but feelings take over and it just happened.'
The couple met for the second time the month afterwards and she says it became clear their relationship was developing into something more than a casual fling.
However, when it appeared that their affair had been rumbled last week, Thomas rang him.
She said: 'I rang him and said, "They know about it, you’ve got to speak to someone at the club and get the story quashed.
You’ve got to protect me and yourself". He said "Oh my God". He promised he would look after me.'
But from then on, Imogen only heard from the footballer through his lawyers.
First she was hit with a personal gagging order, which carried the threat of jail, then in the High Court Mr Justice Eady ruled her name could be made public.
She added: 'These injunctions only seem to exist to look after high-profile people. I know what I did was wrong but he’s the one with a wife and children – he’s the cheater. Now my life is in pieces.'
'I can’t stop crying, but I don’t suppose he is because he is protected by the law.'
