Has Rielle had Andrew’s baby yet? She is such a scum. I can’t believe she slept with Andrew the first night she met him. Has she really been around since August 2006? You must be sick of her. I am so sorry. She flirted with Jed that first night too, even when I was right there.:(… I am so sorry about the rumors that Andrew has had lots of affairs like this one… What a bad time this must be for you.

Although it arrived with Heather’s return address, nothing in this e-​mail sounded like her, and Cheri called her as soon as it arrived. Heather answered, sounding very happy that we had called, and explained that she was out on a boat.

“Then you didn’t send me an e-​mail?” asked Cheri.

“No, why do you ask?”

It took less than thirty seconds for the two women to agree that Elizabeth Edwards was the only person who could have had access to Heather’s e-​mail account and the interest in sending the e-​mail in question. The tone of the message and a word like “scum” were so out of character for Heather-but consistent with the attitudes of Mrs. Edwards-and only reinforced the suspicion that she was the source. The incident bothered Heather, because of the invasion of her account, but made us feel sorry for Elizabeth Edwards. She had cancer. She and her husband had just finished a grueling and failed campaign for president. And I believe that deep in her heart, she knew her husband was the father of Rielle Hunter’s baby and that her campaign against me was unfair and dishonest.

When Edwards finally set a date to meet me for a discussion that I intended to use to force an end to his deception, he insisted I come alone and asked that we meet in a restaurant. I agreed to leave Cheri home but demanded we get together in private. There was no way we could settle this in a public place. He agreed, and we settled on a date, Wednesday, June 18, and a place: the River Inn in the Georgetown district of Washington, D.C. I bought a plane ticket and was ready to depart on June 17 when Edwards sent word that he needed to delay our meeting for a day in order to attend the funeral of Meet the Press host Tim Russert, who had died unexpectedly. Despite the cost and inconvenience, I rescheduled my flight and arrived in D.C. on Thursd“ D.ay morning. (Only later would I learn that Edwards never went to the funeral.) Pam Marple, the attorney who wrote the statement declaring that I was Rielle Hunter’s lover, picked me up at the airport and drove me to the hotel, where I sat in the lobby.

The plan called for the senator to ring my cell phone and tell me the room number where I was to find him. Ninety minutes after the appointed time, I started leaving messages on Fred’s phone. When he called me back, he said, “He is about to call you. Calm down. Let’s get this taken care of.”

I called Cheri and told her it was finally about to happen. While I was talking to her, I saw one of the senator’s latest body men, Matthew Nelson, walk out of the elevator. “Hey, Cheri, I gotta go,” I said, and got up to speak to him. He was shocked to see me but tried to act nonchalant.

“What are you doing here?”

I told him I was visiting some friends and then asked him why he was in town. Matthew said he was there with the senator, who had just filled in for Obama at an event and gotten a five-​minute standing ovation for his speech. He said Edwards believed he was going to get “V.P.” (This was not idle speculation. Tim Toben had relayed to me Edwards’s inside knowledge of polls that showed he would help Obama capture more votes in key states like Ohio and Pennsylvania than any other running mate.)

Just then my cell phone rang. I answered to hear Edwards’s familiar voice asking me to come upstairs. I said okay and then dialed Cheri for encouragement. She said, “Try to stay calm. And whatever you do, don’t hit him!”

On the elevator ride up I seethed and I thought about how only a consummate actor, or a psychologically disturbed human being, could have greeted me so cheerfully knowing what was about to happen. On the fifth floor I got out of the elevator and turned right to find the suite where he was waiting. I knocked and he answered with a Cheshire- ​cat grin and said how glad he was to see me. I responded that I wished I could say the same.

He led me into the suite and sat down with his legs folded up on the chair in a very casual way and acted like he was shocked to see me upset. He tried to talk about how he had just given an incredible speech and was certain to be picked to run as vice president. I cut him off, saying I had run into Matthew downstairs. For a moment he seemed troubled by this but then said he didn’t care because Matthew was loyal to him, not Elizabeth.

He said he didn’t know why I had come to see him and suggested I start the conversation. I began by asking why the “fuck” he hadn’t called me in three months. I criticized him for missing Eliza’s funeral and failing to call people whom he had promised to contact on my behalf.

After trying to minimize my complaints, he then tried to soothe my feelings. He asked why I was upset and told me he loved me. He insisted that our relationship was unch“onsanged and that he hadn’t been in touch with anyone because he was depressed about the election.

I exploded. I asked how many people did the shit for him that my family had done. I told him he owed us a call. And that it was inexcusable that he had skipped Eliza’s funeral. Bunny truly loved him, had given him millions of dollars and never asked anything else from him in return.

Backpedaling, he said that Bunny had assured him that she was not upset about the funeral. I corrected him, saying that Bunny was too dignified to complain, or say how much he had hurt her.

I hit a nerve. He put up his hands and talked about how we had been friends for years, had been through so much together, and that nothing had changed between us for him. He then used one of his old tricks, blaming someone else for his problems and trying to bond with me over marital problems. He said he knew Cheri was upset with me and that he understood what it felt like because Elizabeth was being hard on him.

Exasperated, I looked at him with fury in my eyes and said, “Jesus Christ.”

He told me that Elizabeth screamed all the time about me to him, and that he actually defended me. Edwards said that his wife believed that I had ruined the presidential campaign and their reputation. I told him of course she thinks that-he told her all that. He insisted, “I am going through hell.”

He was veering way off the main topic I wanted to discuss and I tried to bring him back in line by recalling that he had abandoned me, and my family. He denied this and said he wasn’t the kind of person to abandon someone he cared deeply about.

“Not that kind of person? Not that kind of person?” I then started to name people he had betrayed or abandoned without cause, including Elizabeth, Julianna Smoot, Josh Stein, David Axelrod, Bunny Mellon, John Kerry, Josh Brumberger, and others. Before I could finish, he lost his cool. He jumped up and slammed his fist down on the table. “No one fucking talks to me like that. No one.” When he ripped into Cheri, accusing her of talking to the press and others about Rielle and the baby, I shouted, “Bullshit!” right in his face.

He asked what the “fuck” I wanted.

I said, “Nothing,” and stood up. Our faces were about a foot apart over the coffee table and I was ready to fight him right there. He told me to get the “fuck” out. I told him he could read about it in the newspapers.

I flung open the door and it hit the wall with a loud bang. I walked down to the elevator trying to make a dramatic exit. I could feel him nervously looking at me as I pushed the call button. As I waited for the elevator, some of the drama drained out of the moment. Finally he walked down the hall and asked me to come back.