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Weekend Magazine of the Daily Mail, August 18. Brendan Cole and Camilla Dallerup were lovers and dance partners until his TV twirls with newsreader Natasha Kaplinsky tore them apart. Here, they each tell Daily Mail's Rebecca Hardy their side of the story – and reveal why they are about to dance together one last time. Brendan Cole, 31, had been dancing professionally with his then fiance'e Camilla Dallerup for eight years when they split up in 2004, the year he won Strictly Come Dancing with newsreader Natasha Kaplinsky. Since then he has appeared in Love Island and Just The Two Of Us. In September, Brendan and Camilla will be reunited when they represent the UK in the Eurovision Dance Contest. He says: "You were my life, my everything – the whole package. Right from the start I thought we’d be together for ever. I was crazy about you. To think of you ever being hurt by anybody was the worst thing I could have imagined. I still can’t get my head round the fact that I hurt you. There have been many times that I’ve wished I hadn’t screwed things up. I was never involved with Natasha Kaplinsky. I’ve been linked with many people I’ve not slept with, or even snogged. There’s truth to some of them. I’m a 31- year- old bloke and, yes, I enjoy partying, but it’s not as exciting as the relationship we had. I’d much rather have our relationship than the parties. But you know that, Camilla. You know what’s true and what’s not. We were together all the time. Do you remember when I asked you to marry me in Hong Kong, how hard it was buying the ring without you knowing? I think you thought I was having an affair because I had to try to find time away to arrange everything. I knew your answer would be yes before you said it. We just knew that our future was together. Looking back to that first series of Strictly Come Dancing we did three years ago, I wonder, ‘ What was I thinking?’ But that was the whole point – I wasn’t thinking. I could never have foreseen how massive the whole production was going to be and when it happened I wasn’t ready for it. I wasn’t grown up enough to deal with it. We’d never spent more than three or four nights apart, then, all of a sudden, we were spending days and nights apart. I went from being part of the two of us to being my own person for the first time. People were phoning me asking questions – trivial things such as what song are you dancing to next week? It made me feel a bit important. There was an element of ego in there. I think the main thing for me was that I was doing something on my own. From the first day I met Natasha I believed we could win. It was Natasha’s face and name people were voting for, but everything that happened was as a result of my decisions – what music to use, what dress she wore, how she was feeling. On the show, it was all about the chemistry – and the chemistry was there. I knew you were hurting because of the attention Natasha and I were getting, but I couldn’t get my head round it. I was working on the show from morning until night. We started fighting – and then we stopped speaking. There was so much animosity. You asked me to sort our relationship out, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have time. I thought we would after the show – but we didn’t. When the programme finished, it wasn’t a good time for me. You’d moved out and I was alone for the first time in eight years. I had no business partner and no best friend. Hundreds of things reminded me of you. I was angry, too. We’d both said a lot of things in the heat of the moment. Now, three years later, I can talk to you about it. But back then, when our feelings were running so high, I couldn’t. We weren’t in a rational state. Then, when I first saw you with Fabio [D’Alonzo, Camilla’s new Italian financier boyfriend], that was so hard to deal with. The worst thing is that he’s such a lovely guy. But even tougher to take was seeing you dance with Ian [Waite, Camilla’s new dance partner]. That was our life. I didn’t want to dance with anyone else, and I suppose I didn’t want you to, either. I asked you hundreds of times to dance one last time with me, but the timing was never right. When I was asked to do the Eurovision Dance Contest I turned it down because I thought, ‘ You’ve got a dance partner, you’ve got a boyfriend – there’s no way.’ Then I mentioned it to you and you said, ‘ Let’s do it.’ I hadn’t danced properly for three years, but incredibly, when I took your hand to dance again in rehearsals in July, it felt just like it always did. When I dance with you, all the emotions are there. There’s love – all sorts of things – but I also know it’ll be the last time we dance together.

Camilla Dallerup, 33, was born in Denmark and has been dancing since she was two, specialising in the Latin American style. She has competed in all four series of Strictly Come Dancing and has also worked as a model, actress and television presenter. Since splitting up with her professional partner, Brendan, to whom she was engaged, she now dances with Ian Waite. She says: "Never did I think we would ever dance together again – never, never, never. You hurt me so much. We had the most amazing relationship. We worked together. We were lovers – it was us against the world. But, from the first day of Strictly Come Dancing, it was as if you walked out of the door and came back a different man. What freaked me out the most was that I thought we finally had what we wanted. Our career was going brilliantly. We were supposed to be going to the World Championships to represent Great Britain. We’d bought our home. I believed I knew you and you knew me, but suddenly my best friend changed. You were a different person. I honestly didn’t know who I was living with – and that scared me. Suddenly you had this macho, egotistical need. I’d never seen you that way. What I found strange was that when we first got together, you were so content, so calm and down to earth. Then, there was that… whatever it was… when you danced with Natasha and people started loving you. The papers started writing that we’d split up when we hadn’t even fallen out that badly, or that I’d moved out of our flat when I was still there. It was hard to keep a cool head. I had nowhere to go, no one to talk to. In the beginning I was happy when you were doing well and I wanted you to be successful. But it was painful to watch because we were breaking up. We began to fight the whole time. I now realise that you didn’t know what you were thinking because your head was in turmoil. Even your mum tried to talk to you. I do understand now that you felt you hadn’t quite made it and wanted more, but I didn’t understand it at the time, because of the cocoon we lived in. You were the last person I’d have expected to let success go to your head. I tried to talk to you, but I just couldn’t reach you, and the more I tried, the more I couldn’t. It was awful – the worst time of my life. It’s hard for you to understand because you haven’t seen it from the other side. I felt so alone. I told you I really needed you to save the relationship, but you didn’t. I ended up going back to Denmark to spend time with my family. I needed people around me who I could trust. I cried so much, but I also had time to think. You’d disappointed me so much, I knew there was no way back. I couldn’t take any more. I think that working on the second series of Strictly Come Dancing helped us. We had to act professionally and get on. A lot of people asked how I could do it with you and Natasha [ who was standing in for Bruce Forsyth’s co- presenter, Tess Daly], but I don’t believe in bitterness. You did dance with her and there was a lot of chemistry or whatever, and that was very hard. You irritated me. My new boyfriend, Fabio, has been great. I’ve always liked being two and sharing. When we made up enough for the three of us to start having drinks together, it was so nice when you said, ‘ I hate it that Fabio’s such a nice guy.’ Now, Brendan, I think we just lived our lives a different way around. I partied a lot before I met you, but you were only 20. I think you’re doing your partying now. Obviously, we’ve got each other back as friends – if you ever needed me I’d be there for you and you know that – but it’s never going to be the same. We were totally dependent on each other and that part has died. I suppose we could have gone through life and made it if we’d given each other enough space. Maybe, if something like that happens to me again, I won’t give up, and maybe you’ll fight harder for something in your life. I know the hardest part for you was seeing me dance with Ian. You’ve asked me a thousand times if we could have one last dance. When you were very sad, I said that maybe one day we’ll work together again, but I never thought it was the right time. I was surprised, too, when we danced the rumba in rehearsals for the Eurovision contest, because it felt like we’d never ever let go. We just picked up where we left off. Do you remember when you gave me that card with how you felt about me, which you wrote on the night you proposed? I thought then that we’d dance for ever. Ours was such a beautiful story, but it ended in a mess. Now we have a chance to give it a happy ending after all. Eurovision Dance Contest is on BBC1 on 1 September.