I've Made £300k as a Hooker

STUNNING star student Paige Ashley turned her back on a lawyer's career to make £1million as a real life Belle de Jour.

Just like the anonymous sex blogger who last week revealed herself as scientist Dr Brooke Magnanti, Paige became a hooker to fund her studies.

But unlike Dr Magnanti, Paige was seduced by the chance to earn up to £20,000 a time and gave up her dream to work in vice full time.

Six years later she has £300,000 in the bank, a posh North London flat, a soft-top sports car and a boob job. But although Paige has vowed to keep on hooking until she has saved the magic million, she admits: "I wouldn't say I was happy.

"I can't turn my back on this. I'm making too much money. But all I've ended up doing is giving myself a hollow life.

"I should have roughed it with the other students. Now I'd love to turn back the clock and be slumming it in a bedsit."

Like the real-life Belle de Jour - played by Billie Piper in the BBC series Secret Diary of a Call Girl - Paige came from a comfortable middle-class home.

Her parents are wealthy farm owners and she enjoyed a privileged childhood. She went to a well-regarded school in Weybridge, Surrey, where she got four A-levels - including three grade As.

Her next step was to go to college to become a lawyer but her mum and dad said she had to learn to stand on her own two feet. "They said there'd be no handouts for uni so I decided to get the money myself," explained Paige.

"The problem was I'd had a nice upbringing and didn't want to slum it in some grotty bedsit spooning Pot Noodles into my mouth and drinking cider."

Then a pal confessed she'd joined a London escort agency, so Paige signed up too. But it was far from glamourous.

She recalled: "There's not a lot going for what I call bottom-end escorting.

Grunted

"My first client was a fat lawyer, who met me in a Travelodge. I remember lying back while he grunted on top of me. Not good! His breath stank - it was a big turn-off. But at least I had money.

"One bloke wanted me to re-enact a fantasy that he was a baby and I had to feed him with a bottle. Another insisted on putting on MY clothes before sex.

"I'd meet them in hotels that were usually grotty flea pits."

After two months she had £2,000 and applied to universities. But then another firm that had seen her photo on the escort agency website got in touch.

"They wanted to see if I was well- spoken and could conduct myself well in social situations," said Paige. "They asked if I wanted to join them, and told me I'd be earning £5,000 to £10,000.

"I thought that was a month but they said per BOOKING and that I could be going to locations all over the world. It seemed too good to be true."

Her first job was meeting an American businessman at a Michelin-starred restaurant in London's Mayfair then going to his hotel. He paid £5,000 for the night.

Paige said: "I was told to go out and buy a little black dress, keep the receipt and he'd pay for it. This was a million miles from the jobs I was used to, where I'd turn up and just be thankful the bloke had two eyes, a nose and a mouth!

"He was waiting for me with a bunch of flowers. He pretended he knew me and we chatted, ate and drank wine. We went back to his hotel and he ordered champagne before asking me to undress.

"I enjoyed the whole experience. I'd never been pampered before. Later he told me he was married with three kids.

"Most of my clients were married but this seemed more dishonest because he was wining and dining me. If his wife knew, she'd be devastated.

"I lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling, feeling numb. But I knew I'd have to put those sorts of thoughts behind me and get on with it." Her first job abroad was in Spain, where she spent a week as a 65-year-old businessman's "wife" for £30,000. She has since been flown to Australia, LA, Las Vegas, the Middle East and Brazil by other men.

"My biggest one-off job was with three Arab businessmen at the Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi," she said. "It's a seven-star hotel and everything is decked out in gold leaf. They paid me £20,000 for one night with all of them. By morning I was exhausted.

"Arab men are fascinated by Western women. We're almost like status symbols to them. I've met girls working in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Bahrain who've made a million out of escorting."

Her worst bookings with her new agency have been in Britain - with MPs. She said: "My job has taken me right to the heart of Westminster. I've had sex with about a dozen MPs at different times, all of them Conservatives and all what I'd term upper-class.

"They seem to think they're being naughty by spending £5,000 to have a night with me. They're rubbish in bed - all fingers and fumbling. I find them pretty distasteful.

"Funnily enough, since the expenses scandal broke I haven't met any."

Three years ago Paige told her parents about her job. "I expected them to go mad," she said. "Amazingly they didn't. Mum's first words were: 'Do they wear a condom?' I said: 'Of course they do.' She was a bit shocked I think, as was Dad. He sort of shook his head and got on with life." Since then Paige has been getting on with her chosen way of life.

But she now admits: "I've slept with more than 500 men, I travel the world and make lots of money but I wouldn't say I was happy. My job means I simply don't trust men - they are all ruled by what is between their legs.

"And all the glitz and glamour has gone out of it. I find five-star hotels pretty soulless places populated with people who should have better things to spend their money on."

She went on: "I've seen the world. I've been pampered, mollycoddled and spoilt, what more is there to do?

"At the age of 25 I feel a little bit burnt-out. But I'm tied to the golden handcuffs that is high-class escorting."