Jul 5, 2011 12:19 GMT  ·  By

Over the weekend, another royal wedding took place: Charlene Wittstock and Prince Albert of Monaco tied the knot in a 3-day, 60 million Euro affair that didn’t even lack a healthy dose of drama. Reports have it that Charlene tried to run away at least three times before the ceremony.

Late last week, reports started to make the rounds that Charlene had been detained at the airport, as she was about to flee to her native South Africa to get away from Albert and the marriage with him.

She was eventually “convinced” to return but her passport was confiscated, reports in the French press cited by the Daily Mail said.

The same tabloid is now claiming that that wasn’t Charlene’s only attempt at running away: she’d done it two times before, both times with negative results.

“The former Charlene Wittstock, 33, reportedly made her first escape attempt when she travelled to Paris in May to try on her wedding dress. During the visit, she ‘took refuge’ in her country’s embassy in the French capital, sources in Monaco said,” the Mail writes.

“The allegations, which are surprising considering she went ahead with the wedding on Saturday, emerged in the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche. It went on to report that later in May, Charlene made a second apparent attempt to escape during the Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix,” adds the same publication.

Word online and in tabloids has it that Charlene was talked into going through with the wedding to help Albert cover his “checkered” past, just as allegations are surfacing that he has at least 2 other illegitimate children.

At the same time, she’s reportedly agreed to provide him with an heir to the throne – and she gets in exchange the lifestyle of a multi-millionaire.

“The truth of the rumor is that Albert faces paternity tests following a claim by at least one former lover. Albert will not have an official heir until Princess Charlene bears him one,” an inside source says.

Having struck an “agreement” somehow against her will would also explain why she seemed so downcast during the ceremony over the weekend – and why she burst into tears several times, it is being said.