West coast paparazzi have been on high alert since Britney Spears gave birth at UCLA Medical Center in Santa Monica last week. “There’s a million-dollar bounty on that baby’s head,” says one veteran snapper. “Everyone wants that shot.” In response, we hear the newly deflated pop tart has taken extraordinary steps to keep her bundle of joy from their prying lenses—so she can sell the baby pics herself.
“Britney’s hired several look-alikes to pose as her and she’s reactivated her entire security team that she used back when she was on tour,” says a source close to the family. “She certainly doesn’t want her baby to be endangered, but most of the precautions are to keep the paparazzi from getting any photos of the kid,” named Sean Preston.
That doesn’t mean supermarket shoppers won’t be admiring the newborn in the checkout line sometime soon. We hear his not-so-virginal mother has been approached by wise men from all the major tabloids bearing competing offers for a first look at the long-foretold infant—and they’re not talking frankincense. Sources say that OK! magazine alone has promised her $2 million for an exclusive cover shoot.
As for dear old dad? “Kevin gets 50 percent of all that money. Tabloid money is the only real money he ever makes,” says the source. Of course, if the paparazzi get there first, any windfall the couple has in mind would decrease significantly. In other words, “Britney has to keep Preston under wraps if she wants the big bucks!”
Asked about the $2 million offer, OK! rep Marissa Schneer said she was unable to discuss any negotiations until they were finalized. Spears’s publicist, Leslie Sloan Zelnick, declined to comment on the bounty or Spears’s plan to claim it for herself. If all goes well, let’s hope the money gets put into a college fund—for the whole family.