COUPLESHugh Hefner's Ex-Wife Crystal Engaged to James Ward After 1 Year of Dating: 'He Completely Surprised Me'
Crystal Hefner is excited to be a bride again!
Crystal Hefner and James Ward recently embarked on a month-long trip to Africa to celebrate their one-year anniversary, but it wasn't until after the vacation concluded that the blonde beauty was left speechless, as her beau got down on one knee!
The ring was a six-carat, "vintage mine-cut" diamond.
Crystal Hefner and James Ward are engaged after one year of dating.
"It feels like a full-circle moment. James completely surprised me," Hugh Hefner's ex-wife told Us Weekly of the Friday, April 25, proposal. "He had a hidden staircase and a winding trail cleared to reveal a handcrafted deck perched above a dramatic cliffside overlooking the ocean. It was the exact spot where we’d had a quiet picnic together a year ago — a place that became ‘ours.’"
The model's beau proposed at their home in Hawaii.
"I had no idea he was secretly turning it into something permanent and symbolic," the model continued to rave. "I thought we were just going for a walk, but when I saw the flowers, the handwritten notes, and the sea stretching endlessly in front of us, I knew something extraordinary was about to happen."
Crystal had no clue that during their "peaceful, unplugged adventure," James was "coordinating this incredibly elaborate and meaningful proposal back home."
"I’m still amazed he pulled it off so seamlessly," the former Playboy star confessed. "I had told him I had never really been surprised before, so I think he felt like the challenge was accepted."
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The former Playboy star admitted she was 'completely surprised' when he popped the question.
Crystal said they want to "enjoy being engaged" for awhile, but she thinks they could tie the knot next year.
The star first rose to fame in 2009 when she began dating Hugh, whom she was still married to when he died at age 91 in 2017. She wound up calling off the wedding in 2011 five days before the ceremony, but they went on to get hitched the following year.
Crystal Hefner was married to Playboy founder Hugh Hefner from 2012 to 2017.
After his passing, Crystal alleged the mogul "imprisoned" her at the Playboy mansion and said there was constant sexual abuse taking place behind close doors.
The Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself author also admitted she was never "in love" with the businessman.
“I realized I was dealing with a really big power imbalance,” Crystal recalled in a previous interview. “It seemed like a world of success and fantasy, but everyone’s having to sleep with an 80-year-old. There’s a price. Everything has a price.”
The blonde beauty admitted she was never 'in love' with the business mogul.
The Girls Next Door alum wasn't sure if she would ever find the right man after everything she went through, but fortunately, James came into her life.
"I’ve done a lot of healing that was very necessary since the mansion. I didn’t know what it was like to be in a healthy relationship. Sometimes, it feels foreign," she spilled. "But I believe that as long as you keep working on it, your brain kind of rewires itself, and you can be in a really happy, healed place."
