Rumors have swirled for years that Prince William had an alleged affair with friend Rose Hanbury.
Although royal author Omid Scobie touched upon the reported scandal in his latest biography “Endgame,” he believes that nothing even happened between the Prince of Wales, 41, and Hanbury, 39.
In a new interview with Entertainment Tonight, Scobie noted that he understands why the gossip has spread like wildfire regarding the allegations that William cheated on wife, Kate Middleton.
“Unfortunately, if a rumor’s left to kind of do its own thing it can run 20 laps around the world before you even think about what, how you want to kind of address it,” the writer explained.
“They never addressed it, so those rumors will never go away even though there’s no truth to suggest that they are true,” he added.
William and Middleton, 41, married in April 2011 after eight years of dating.
Hanbury is a British peeress who is also former model. She married David Cholmondeley, 7th Marquess of Cholmondeley, in 2009 and they share three children.
The duo have been pals with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge in the past. Reports of infidelity first came about in 2019 after a British tabloid released the news.
But things seemed to die down as Hanbury even attended King Charles’ coronation earlier this year.
Scobie also noted how he was “very careful” in his book about the “allegations against William, Kate’s and their fallout with Rose Hanbury.”
He added: “For legal reasons there are so many things that one can’t go into but I thought it was really important, even if a rumor is a rumor. And I really don’t see proof that there is more to this than just a tittle-tattle, you know.”
Scobie then explained how Kensington Palace feared that the rumors would “impact negatively on William’s reputation” and alleged that the Firm decide to use Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to divert attention way from the gossip.
“[The rumors] trend on Twitter on a regular basis,” Scobie said. “That’s something that’s incredibly damaging, I think, for William.”
“It probably looks even worse, actually, that there was a kind of willingness to throw Harry under the bus simply to make these things disappear,” he said.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex were seemingly “used as currency, to avoid crises and other areas,” Scobie told SheKnows.
In 2022, celebrity gossip account Deuxmoi posted a blind item that forced many fans to believe that it was William.
“This British royal’s extramarital affair is an open secret in London… and is the talk of every party and newsdesk,” the post read.
“The wife doesn’t mind her and in fact prefers her husband getting his sexual needs met elsewhere, as long as things don’t become emotional, which was the case with the last woman,” it continued.