Before setting out for Pennsylvania to cover Jon and Kate Gosselin for Star Magazine, reporter Kate Major joked to friends, “I could be the next Kate!”
Turns out that’s exactly what happened.
It was not long before the 26-year-old began a torrid fling with Jon – all while he was still hitting it with family-friend-turned-girlfriend Hailey Glassman.
When she met Jon at his $1.1 million home July 17, it was love at first sight for Kate Major. It began when Jon’s bodyguard asked her to move her car.
“I introduced myself as a reporter and said, ‘I’d like to meet Jon,'” Major recalls. The bodyguard’s response to her inquiry? “I bet he wants to meet you.”
At that point, the bodyguard snapped a cell phone photo of Kate and texted it to Jon Gosselin, who wrote back immediately, “Yes! I want to talk to her.”
So basically, Jon is being pimped out by his bodyguard. Soon enough, she was inside his house. Shortly after, he was inside her … gossip magazine.
A whirlwind romance – and love triangle – followed immediately.
Hailey Glassman, Jon’s 22-year-old play thing, was completely clueless (which is par for the course for her) about Kate Major and her romance with Jon that she even gushed to Kate about Jon when the trio met for an interview at Starbucks.
“I felt conflicted about liking Jon when I realized how nice [Hailey] was – I felt so bad for her,” Kate Major said afterward. “But I didn’t plan anything.”
Jon Gosselin says he is single now, and focused only on his kids. But he and the former Star reporter (she resigned due to a conflict of interest, as if anyone takes Star seriously anyway) spent Friday in NYC and the weekend in the Hamptons.
“Jon had an appointment in New York City,” a source said. “Jon had a meeting and Kate needed to pick up some clothes. Then they headed back to the Hamptons.”
The reality TV dad and Kate 2.0 have been staying with Michael Lohan, and on their most recent trip out to Long Island, they dined at Red Bar Brasserie with The Real Housewives of New York City star Jill Zarin and her husband Bobby (above).
Who should Jon Gosselin date?