Astrid Stawiarz/Getty; John Nacion/Getty Camille Kostek opened up about being skeptical toward romantically pursuing her longtime boyfriend Rob Gronkowski on a live taping of Kristin Cavallari's Let's Be Honest tour Kostek said she was unable to confidently pursue him because relationships between players and cheerleaders were "off limits" "I was doing the appearance with my captain at the time and I was thinking, 'This is a setup, like, I think I'm being hazed right now,' " the model said Camille Kostek approached her relationship with caution. The model, 33, opened up about being skeptical toward romantically pursuing her longtime boyfriend,Rob Gronkowski, 36, on a live taping ofKristin Cavallari'sLet's Be Honest tour. Kostek began by mentioning that she met the former Patriots tight end at a charity event after a highly publicized breakup. However, she was unable to confidently pursue him because relationships between players and cheerleaders were "off limits." "The football players don't get in trouble, but the cheerleaders get kicked off the team," she explained, adding that she doesn't "think that's a rule anymore." "At the time, I was literally hiding. I had just gone through a really bad breakup about a month or two before, and I went to this charity event. And Rob kept looking at me. I kept looking at him, and I was like, 'He probably looks at everybody.' And then his number got slipped to me through Jermaine Wiggins," Kostek said. According to theSports Illustrated Swimsuitmodel, Wiggins asked her to sign a Patriots poster with her phone number for Gronkowski. "I was like, 'Oh, sir. I can't do that. I'll get kicked off the team.' And he was like, 'Rob knew you'd rookie move him with this and get scared,' " she said. Instead, Gronkowski wrote his own phone number on his name tag. "I refused to write my number because I was so scared of getting kicked off the team and someone finding out. I was doing the appearance with my captain at the time, and I was thinking, 'This is a setup, like, I think I'm being hazed right now. There's no way this is real,' " the model said. Kostek ended up taking down Gronkowski's number at the event. When the model was visiting home for Thanksgiving, she and her mom decided to give the number a call after a Patriots game to see if it was really the football player's digits. "I said, 'If this is Rob, he will still be kind of sweaty. He'll kinda be coming out of the game.' I'm going to FaceTime him, face my phone to the ceiling, and see if he's gonna answer," she explained. "So my mom and I FaceTime together with the phone to the ceiling, and this man answered the phone with the phone to the ceiling of the plane. And I said, 'Who's this?' And he was like, 'You called me. Who's this?' And so I was like, 'Alright. It's a guy.' And that was our first call," Kostek said. She said Gronkowski called her when he got home and they talked for nearly three hours. "He was like, 'When do I get to see you in person?' I was like, 'Oh, never.' And then that's when I started pulling in my Jeep Grand Cherokee into his garage," Kostek said, adding that she felt "so scared." Alexander Tamargo/Getty When asked about how they managed to keep their relationship under wraps for two years, she said, "Honestly, when people ask, like, 'What's the recipe to success with this relationship?' It was really dating behind closed doors for two years. Rob is my best friend." The retired NFL player and the modelfirst crossed paths in 2013. After keeping their romance quiet for the first two years, PEOPLE reported thatthey were an item in September 2015when Kostek was spotted cheering the tight end on in the stands at one of his games. Gronkowski and Kostek made their red carpet debut at Nickelodeon's Kids' Choice Sports Awards in July 2016. In May, Kostek told PEOPLE in an exclusive interview about the time her boyfriend accidentally got theminto a snowmobile accidentin the mountains of Park City, Utah. The PEOPLE Appis now available in the Apple App Store! Download it now for the most binge-worthy celeb content, exclusive video clips, astrology updates and more! "What happened on that snowmobile ride?" Kostek jokingly asked Gronkowski on the red carpet at the 2025Sports Illustrated SwimsuitLaunch Party. "You flipped us." The former football player said, "It was a really slow turn and it was so much snow, so we kind of sunk and then-" "It was crazy," Kostek chimed in. "We just fell off," Gronkowski said, adding that the incident "wasn't anything dangerous." Read the original article onPeople
