Billie Jean King reveals her ‘secret’ 2018 marriage to Ilana Kloss, her partner of 42 years

Via PEOPLE: For 42 years, Billie Jean King has been in love with her former doubles partner Ilana Kloss. The couple “wore each other’s rings for years,” King says, and called themselves “life partners.” But they never married. Not when Elton John nudged, offering to sing at the wedding. Not when John McEnroe needled (“C’mon, Billie Jean … Wrap it up and put a bow on it already!” he told her one night in Las Vegas, one tennis legend to another).

Or so the story went — until now.

In a new interview with People and in her upcoming memoir All In (on sale Aug. 17) the 20-time Wimbledon champ (who also holds 39 Grand Slam titles) reveals that she and Kloss, now the co-founder and CEO of Billie Jean King Enterprises, were secretly wed on October 18, 2018 by former NYC Mayor David Dinkins in his apartment on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

King, 77, says that until the writing of All In, only three other people knew about the marriage: Dinkins’ wife Joyce and an aide, who acted as witnesses that day (the aide also snapped the newlyweds one-and-only wedding photograph); plus the City Hall worker who processed the marriage license.

“Nobody threw rice or smashed wedding cake in the other’s face,” King writes. “One of the brides wore jeans and a lovely red scarf and the other had on a black shirt, a comfortable warm‑up suit, and pearls — ha! — a personal touch of glamour that Ilana still teases me about.”

Why the change of mind after 42 years?

“I felt very married to Ilana, whether I had a piece of paper or not,” King tells PEOPLE.

“But I’d had a big problem with trusting and it meant a lot to show my trust in Ilana.” Plus, King writes in the book, “Years from now, I never want anyone to question how much I was committed to you.”

As for the secrecy, King quotes Kloss, 65, as explaining, “So much of our life has been public, keeping this private was something special we could hold on to, just for us.”

Not even their closest friends and aides knew until they received an advance copy of All In from King. “It was their gift to all of us to read it in the book,” says King’s publicist of 30 years, Tip Nunn.