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When paparazzi photographs emerged of Eamonn Holmes and his new girlfriend enjoying a mini break in the City of Love this week, gossip ran rife about their relationship among the presenter's closest friends.
While a miserable looking Eamonn, 65, shuffled around in an electronic mobility chair - which he uses due to a crippling back problem - Katie Alexander, who is 21 years his junior, was alongside, sporting a £1,000 Hermes scarf, a £139.99 Mango faux leather coat with a £1,600 Louis Vuitton handbag as they left the Louvre museum in Paris.
What puzzled Eamonn's friends was the dazzling ring on psychotherapist Katie's wedding finger - given that the Good Morning presenter's divorce from his ex-wife and co-host Ruth Langsford is nowhere near complete, and that his agent had insisted the pair were only in Paris to 'visit art and museums'.
Everyone is asking the same question: what would Katie, an attractive and intelligent 43-year-old divorcee, see in Eamonn, who - following his recent health battles - is said to be becoming increasingly cantankerous? (Since a nasty fall in 2022, Eamonn has finally given in to using a walker and mobility chair. He also underwent a double hip replacement operation in 2015.)
Katie, a mother of two, is said to spend a lot of time at Eamonn's new bachelor pad, a penthouse in a modest block of flats on the Kingston one-way system in south-west London.
But friends tell me that they are 'too polite' to ask Holmes about the exact nature of their relationship.
All of Eamonn's friends are asking the same question: what would Katie, an attractive and intelligent 43-year-old divorcee, see in Eamonn, who - following his recent health battles - is said to be becoming increasingly cantankerous?
'It's all a bit weird,' said one. 'Eamonn and Katie spend a lot of time together and he definitely makes murmurs that things are of a romantic nature.
'Eamonn loves a pretty woman and he has always been a big flirt. He and Katie spend a lot of time together now and they do, despite what the photographs imply, have quite a giggle together.
'Plus, she is a psychotherapist and he loves a chat, so they have a bond there, but I can't see them getting married anytime soon.'
Friends say that Eamonn and Ruth, who have 22-year-old son Jack together, had initially struggled to remain amicable during their divorce proceedings but things have 'thawed' recently.
Ruth is said to be 'worried' for Holmes since their split and wants to ensure 'he looks after himself' as he embarks on a new romance.
At work too, it has been a colourful week for Holmes. His GB news co-host, Isabel Webster, who Eamonn has called his 'work wife', was sacked from their breakfast show with immediate effect on Wednesday.
But despite reports that Eamonn was left 'reeling' by the news of Isabel's shock exit, sources tell me he is 'relieved'. Perhaps because, I'm told, she is a close friend of Ruth's.
The two women always got on 'extraordinarily well' before she and Holmes split.
Eamonn and Katie were spotted by paparazzi in Ibiza while enjoying a luxurious cruise around Europe - a freebie given to Eamonn after he signed a lucrative deal to be an ambassador for the holiday company Not Just Travel
'Isabel and Ruth were close,' says a well-placed source. 'And that was always going to cause some issues between Isabel and Eamonn.
'They had a lot of shared friends who had to pick sides, Isabel didn't do that as such but the split got messy. Eamonn and Isabel would argue a bit. Not huge rows - just bickering - but it put added pressure on him at a difficult time and he didn't always enjoy working with her.
'He is in pain at work so he just needs to get in and get out without any aggravation.'
'Eamonn looks depressed when he's at work,' said a GB News insider. 'He just sits there looking miserable.'
Bosses hope he will be cheery about Webster's replacement Ellie Costello who, aged 31, is ten years younger than her predecessor.
'She's bubbly and fun, something that Eamonn really does need right now,' added the source.
Indeed, Eamonn and Katie have been dating since the Mail revealed that he and his wife of 14 years had parted. He and Ruth, who met in 1996, initially kept their relationship secret so as not to upset Eamonn's first wife, Gabriella - with whom Eamonn has three children.
Eamonn met Katie on X (formerly Twitter) in 2015 after she commented on a post and it sparked a conversation. And then, last October - nine months before Eamonn and Ruth confirmed they had separated - they met at a fundraising event in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, for a charity of which Eamonn was a patron and that Katie had worked for.
Friends say that Eamonn and Ruth, who have a 22-year-old son named Jack together, had initially struggled to remain amicable during their divorce proceedings but things have 'thawed' recently
Katie had recently split from her husband of two years, George Alexander, who recently confessed he had a 'lot of sympathy' for Ruth following her split from Eamonn.
'I have had my heart broken when my marriage to Katie ended,' he added.
It's not clear when this early exchange between Eamonn and Katie blossomed into a friendship, but it has been reported that Ruth discovered Eamonn had been showering Katie with gifts in the run up to their split. He had accompanied her on a trip to a safari park with her children, a 14-year-old daughter and 13-year-old son, and had even given them tickets to a Beyonce concert.
But anyone who knows Holmes will be aware that he loves female company. Even when he was with Ruth, friends told me he would cheekily flirt with other women.
One woman told me Eamonn would often arrange to meet up and was very supportive of her career. Another said that Eamonn would make plans with her to socialise, insisting that his then wife Ruth preferred to be at home.
'Eamonn would always say that Ruth didn't want to go far,' said one source close to the star. 'He loved to have a pretty girl on his arm to go anywhere. Ruth works hard, she had both This Morning and Loose Women to host when they were together, as well as a really lucrative job at QVC. She didn't always want to be gallivanting with Eamonn so he would find others to do that with.'
But Eamonn's new relationship seems rather more serious than the others.
Katie has already been to Belfast - somewhere Ruth was not keen to visit - to meet Holmes' three children from his first marriage: Declan, 35, Rebecca, 32, and Niall, 30.
And their jaunt to Paris was one in a long string of romantic dates. On December 5, the couple was seen leaving a Christmas carol concert in west London. Earlier in the day they had been together for the prestigious Television and Radio Industries Club lunch.
In summer, there was a luxurious cruise around Europe - a freebie given to Eamonn after he signed a lucrative deal to be an ambassador for the holiday company Not Just Travel.
They jetted out to Barcelona and boarded the ship - they were in a £1,500-a-night mega suite - and headed to Toulon on the French Riviera, then on to Marina di Carrara in Italy. Next they sailed down to Civitavecchia, north of Rome, before heading on to Ibiza.
They were spotted by paparazzi in Ibiza and again at the airport when they arrived home. I'm told Eamonn hates the attention - and can't work out how the paps always know where he will be.
'He can't quite work out why it keeps happening,' said one source close to him. 'He has an inkling that it might be someone who isn't a massive fan of his and that brings a bit of a cloud to the relationship.'
Perhaps that explains why Eamonn isn't cracking a smile in any of the paparazzi pics. Friends insist he loves life with Katie.
'It might not look like it a lot of the time,' says one friend. 'But he is happier than he has been, he's getting out there and trying to enjoy his autumnal years, despite being in a lot of pain sometimes.
'Again, it might not seem obvious but he is footloose and fancy-free now, and is enjoying some freedom, travelling a lot with an attractive woman on his arm. It's just a shame he doesn't smile a bit more about it.'
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