Tina Knowles revealed that she secretly rekindled her relationship with her ex-husband, Mathew Knowles, after his affair and the birth of a love child ended their marriage.
In her memoir, Matriarch, the 71-year-old mother of Beyoncé and Solange shared that she briefly reunited with Mathew after filing for divorce in 2009, despite learning he had fathered a child with his mistress, Alexsandra Wright.
“He’d changed after new counseling,” she wrote. “I didn’t believe him, but he was persistent, proved he’d gotten help, and as he courted me, I found myself falling in love again. The magnetic pull between us, this cosmic cord I had tried to cut so many times, was stronger than ever.”
Though their marriage was unraveling publicly, Tina admitted the two kept their reconciliation hidden from their daughters.
“We knew the kids would be so mad at us if they found out we were together again,” she wrote. “Our bond seemed stronger because we were sneaking.”
But the secret reunion didn’t last. In 2010, Mathew, now 73, fathered another child with a second woman, TaQoya Branscomb. That betrayal ended things for good.
“I clearly knew my relationship with Mathew was unhealthy, and it was the fear of going it alone that kept me stuck,” Tina wrote.
Their divorce was finalized in 2011.