Dodi Fayed’s fiance says he dumped her by phone just two days before wedding — after pics with Princess Diana emerged
WHEN the story broke that Diana was dating Dodi Fayed, nobody was more shocked than the woman who had thought she was marrying the billionaire’s son in just two days’ time.
American model Kelly Fisher, then 30, says Dodi dumped her by phone on August 7, 1997 – the day his relationship with Diana first hit the news.
She says they had been due to marry on August 9 and that they had already been looking forward to starting a family.
On August 10, the day the model had expected to be the first day of her new life, she instead woke up to the first photo of the world’s most famous couple.
A fuzzy image dubbed “The Kiss”, it showed the pair embracing on the yacht Jonikal off St Tropez.
It had been taken by an Italian paparazzo using a telephoto lens on August 4 and was bought for £300,000 by a Sunday newspaper.
In total, images from the holiday were sold for more than £3million around the world.
Kelly had been in St Tropez at the time the first kiss picture was taken, staying aboard another of the Fayed family’s yachts.
She had thought it was a pre-wedding holiday with Dodi – who she now realised had been two-timing her.
She told The Sun this week: “I was heartbroken to see the pictures of Diana and Dodi together. But the most heartbroken I ever, ever was – ever – was when he died. That was too much for me. It was incredibly difficult.”
But before the tragic car crash, Kelly moved quickly from heartbreak to anger.
By August 14 she was back in California – Dodi had recently bought her a home in Malibu – and was exacting her revenge. At a press conference she wept as her attorney announced plans to sue the love rat for “emotionally leaving her at the altar”.
With a flourish, the lawyer held up one of two sapphire and diamond rings Kelly claimed 42-year-old Dodi had bought for her. She said the model would not talk to the press but when asked by a reporter why she was still wearing the other engagement ring, Kelly sobbed: “Because I loved him.”
A tell-all newspaper interview followed, where Kelly claimed Dodi was a dud in bed who made love to her in the moonlight in St Tropez before heading off to romance Diana during the day.
She also alleged that during their 13-month romance, Dodi had handed her a cheque for £100,000 which bounced. But her planned £340,000 “breach of contract” lawsuit came to a sudden end when Dodi was killed with Di.
The memory is still agonising for Kelly, now aged 50, married to pilot Mikhail Movshina and mother to a six-year-old daughter, Alexandra Grace.
The ex-model said: “You go in the course of three weeks from being engaged to Dodi to being left for the most famous, gorgeous woman in the world, to them all dying.
“In three weeks. That was just terrible. I was pretty young. It was pretty bad.”
She says the pain was made worse by Dodi’s father Mohamed denying his son had ever been engaged to her, and accusing her of being a “gold-digger”.
Kelly, who now lives in Aiken, South Carolina, and works as a property developer, said: “He was talking about the lawsuit. But I had stopped working – I put my life on hold.”
She had featured on the front covers of Elle and W before meeting Dodi in Paris in July 1996. She says he convinced her to give up her lucrative work and gave her a £2,000-a-day allowance.
He also bought her a £5million home in Malibu where she thought they would live together, and gave her a £180,000 engagement ring in February 1997.
After learning of Dodi’s romance with Diana, Kelly phoned her ex to vent her fury. A 20-minute recording of the call was played in London in 2007 during the inquest into Diana’s death. It captures
Kelly fuming: “You even flew me down to St Tropez to sit on a boat while you seduced Diana all day and f***ed me all night.”
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In the call Dodi insists they had already split, while Kelly rages that they had still been talking about their wedding.
She is also heard to say: “You told me you didn’t even like her. Why do you suddenly like her?”
Dodi calls her “crazy” and “hysterical”.
These days, Kelly says the only pain she feels is on behalf of William and Harry. She said: “I have a daughter now and cannot imagine what would have happened if I was suddenly gone. I can’t imagine what those boys must have felt.”
But she also revealed she has kept one memento of that time two decades ago.
She admitted: “Of course I have the engagement ring.”