Rielle Hunter Says She And John Edwards Have Broken Up

UPDATE: It's almost as if writing a tell-all isn't the best thing for your relationship.

Rielle Hunter said Tuesday that she and John Edwards had been a couple up until late last week, at which point the adulterous pair finally called it quits. For those keeping track at home, that was right about when details from Hunter's new memoir What Really Happened began to generate headlines everywhere from gossip tabloids to political websites. She said that the disgraced ex-senator, however, will still be involved with raising their four-year-old daughter, Quinn.

"We are a family, but as of the end of last week, John Edwards and I are no longer a couple," Hunter told ABC's Good Morning America. "We decided together to end it." Pressed on why they broke up, Hunter declined to elaborate, saying "that's private." She later vaguely mentioned "media scrutiny," saying that "it wears you down after a while."

Hunter's book hit stores Tuesday, but its juiciest bits—including a description of Hunter's first night with Edwards, and her description of his late wife as a "witch on wheels"—quickly found their way onto the Web during a pre-release PR blitz.

Wednesday, June 20: The June 26 release date for Rielle Hunter’s book is almost here, but you don’t have to wait that long to get the inside scoop on the affair that brought an end to John Edwards' political career. The tabloid-ready details are already gushing across the Internet.

Hunter spares seemingly no details as she recounts steamy and intimate encounters with the senator. Fox News reports that Hunter describes the first night she spent with her congressional paramour as the "most extraordinary night of my life," recalling that, "there was a lot of talk, a lot of laughter and zero sleep."

Unsatisfied to restrict the content of her “tell-all” to her pillow talk and four-hour phone calls with the former senator, Hunter drags Edwards’s late wife Elizabeth into the fray describing her as a "crazy," "venomous," and a "witch on wheels"—comments that are unlikely to win her much support in the court of public opinion.

In advance of the 20/20 interview with Hunter slated to air on Friday, ABC News recapped one section of the book in which Hunter describes Elizabeth Edwards’s reaction upon learning of her husband’s affair, writing that she then set her screen saver as an image of John looking at his mistress. For those still craving more of the scandal, you can head on over to ABC to read more.

Monday, June 18: It looks like we're not getting any more details about John Edwards' affair out of the U.S. court system, but never fear: Rielle Hunter has written a tell-all book.

ABC News got its hands on an advance copy of Hunter's What Really Happened, which is set to hit bookstores next Tuesday. The biggest takeaway that ABC seems to have gleaned from its reading: "Hunter was John Edwards' last mistress, but not his first or only one."

Hunter claims in her book that Edwards had affairs with at least two other women dating back two decades, relationships that Hunter says he did not reveal to her until last year, two years after she appeared before a grand jury.

The network explains:

"Ironically, when Edwards first met Hunter in 2006 he lied to her about having more mistresses—not fewer—and only revealed the truth about his relationships years later, when he was set to be tried for using donations from wealthy political supporters to cover up his illicit affair and the daughter he had with Hunter."

ABC is hyping the tell-all as a "bombshell book," no doubt in small part because 20/20 landed an exclusive interview with Hunter that will air this Friday, during which she will apparently elaborate on a topic that she only hints at in writing: the current status of her relationship with Edwards.

She remains somewhat vague on that topic in the book, according to the network, but does suggest that they remain romantically involved and that the disgraced Democrat remains a presence in daughter Frances Quinn Hunter's life.

"I really have no idea what will happen with us," Hunter writes. "The jury is still out. But I can honestly say that the ending is of no concern to me anymore. The love is here. And as sappy as it may sound, I love living in love."

Should it be your sort of thing, check out more details—like the fact that Hunter repeatedly calls Edwards' late wife Elizabeth "crazy" and blames her for her husband's action—about the upcoming book over at ABC News.