By 1968, King realized that she was attracted to women. In 1971, she began an intimate relationship with her secretary, Marilyn Barnett (born Marilyn Kathryn McRae on January 28, 1948). Marilyn Barnett had been living rent-free in Billie Jean and Larry King's Malibu house. In 1979, the Kings asked Barnett to leave their house, but Barnett did not want to. Refusing to leave the house, Barnett threatened to leak records and receipts between the two that she had kept over the years. These receipts included letters from Billie Jean to Marilyn Barnett, credit card receipts, and paid bills. It was not until, when the attempts to leak these records failed, that Marilyn Barnett sued the Kings in 1981 for half their income and the Malibu house where she had been staying. Billie Jean King did not know of the lawsuit until a reporter from the Los Angeles Times asked her about it. Billie Jean King did not want to confirm this, so she continued to deny the relationship. Billie Jean acknowledged the relationship when it became public in a May 1981 palimony lawsuit filed by Barnett, making Billie Jean the first prominent professional female to come out. Feeling she could not admit to the extent of the relationship, Billie Jean publicly called it a fling and a mistake. She remained married to Larry. The lawsuit caused Billie Jean to lose an estimated $2 million in endorsements and forced her to prolong her tennis career to pay attorneys. In December 1981, a court order stipulated that Barnett leave the house, and that her threats to publish private correspondence between her and King in exchange for money, came close to extortion. Barnett's palimony suit was thrown out of court in November 1982 concluding she had no case against Mrs King, and her husband Larry. Ironically, just a few months later in March 1983, King's house that became the basis for the suit instigated by Barnett, was destroyed during a series of freak winter storms that lashed the southern California coastline.