Sunday Mirror (Northern Ireland)
ZOE’S LIVE-IN ROCK
Moves new man in after tragedy
ZOE Ball has moved her businessman boyfriend into her new country pad as their relationship steps up a gear.
The Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two presenter has even given Michael Reed the keys to the flash classic car she bought with ex-husband DJ Norman Cook.
Zoe and Michael looked cosy as they took the
Triumph Stag for a spin. He even helped clear out the garage of her new home in
East Sussex.
It came almost a year after the tragic death of cameraman Billy
Yates who Zoe called the “love of her life”.
A source said: “Zoe has really fallen for
Michael, they’re inseparable. He’s moved in and she lets him drive her car. They’re very committed to one another. Everyone’s really happy to see Zoe smiling again.”
Zoe’s new found happiness comes after an inquest this week heard she had desperately tried to help her ex, cameraman Billy, after he made two suicide attempts. He was found hanged at his flat in Putney, South West London last year aged 40. The hearing was told she paid for a twoweek stay at the Priory as well as therapy for the ex-Royal Marine.
He had been sober since August 2016 but had alcohol in his system when he died in May 2017, leading Westminster Coroner Shirley Radcliffe to record an open verdict.
Zoe has spoken openly about her loss, even fronting a documentary about the tragedy. Zoe Ball’s Hardest Way Home followed her 350 mile Sport Relief cycle from Blackpool to Brighton in his memory.
She started dating construction firm boss Michael, a dad of two, six months after the tragedy.
Now she has moved out of her Brighton home to focus on their relationship. The pair, both 47, have also met each other’s kids. Zoe split from Cook in 2016 after 18 years together, but lived two doors from him so their children Woody, 17, and Nelly, seven, could see them both easily.
She gushed about her new £970,000 cottage in Ditchling – and even has a new hobby in mind. She said: “I live right by the church – the bells are amazing. It’d be fun to be a bell-ringer.”