JOHN EDWARDS booted former mistress Rielle Hunter out of his palatial North Carolina home after a bitter fight over her going public with more details about their torrid affair and love child.
The disgraced politician, who’s desperately trying to get his life back on track, was said to be livid when she told him she planned to publish an updated version of her tell-all book. He accused the 49-year-old blonde of trying to drag their scandalous relationship back into the spotlight for profit, sources tell The ENQUIRER.
“John had told her, ‘Forget about it – it’s history,’ ” said a source. “He viewed the book as a cash grab by Rielle. John was desperate to put the affair behind him and get on with his life, so he ordered Rielle not to do it.”
But Rielle went behind his back and had the book updated anyway. And that led to a blowout fight at John’s Chapel Hill, N.C., estate, where Rielle and their daughter Frances Quinn, 5, often spend time away from their Charlotte home.
“John was so furious about the project, he told Rielle, ‘Get out of my house!’” revealed the source.
The illicit relationship between the then-married Edwards and his campaign videographer was exposed in a series of blockbuster reports by The ENQUIRER, which helped to sink the former senator’s 2008 bid for the presidency. In Rielle’s new memoir, “In Hindsight, What Really Happened: The Revised Edition: John Edwards, Our Daughter, and Me,” she offers a drastically different take on the affair than the previous version of her book, which she released in June 2012.
In the original, which sold just 6,000 copies, Rielle attacked her lover’s cancer-stricken wife, Elizabeth, calling her “a witch on wheels,” “crazy” and “venomous.” In the updated version, Rielle apologizes for the hurt she caused the family and Elizabeth, who died in December 2010.
Along with the Oct. 15 book release, Rielle penned an article for “The Huffington Post” in which she admitted that she “behaved badly” and added: “I hurt Elizabeth and her kids. I hurt her family…I was in love with John Edwards and wanted to be with him, and that desire trumped everything else.”
But Edwards, 60, isn’t buying Rielle’s tale of remorse, and another insider says that the latest dustup was “by far one of their worst fights ever.”
“John said reissuing the book is only going to reopen old wounds. He called her ‘selfish’ and ‘evil’ and said she was once again making his life ‘a living hell.’”
Edwards is having a tough time putting his life back together following the scandal, even though he did manage to dodge prison in 2012 when he was acquitted of charges that he illegally used campaign money to hide his affair with Rielle.
“At this point, John doesn’t think there’s anything he can say to convince anyone he’s sorry for what he’s done,” the insider added. “He’s completely given up.”
