Martha Stewart was so desperate for a new husband, she resorted to “stalking” a wealthy man in the Hamptons — only to be confronted by his girlfriend, her ex-best friend claims in a new book.
In “The Best of Friends: Martha and Me,” Mariana Pasternak — who was close to the doyenne of domesticity for 20 years until she testified against Stewart in her obstruction of justice trial — describes how beneath Stewart’s steely façade, she “could be as naive as a little girl with men.”
Pasternak says in the tell-all out tomorrow from HarperCollins: “There was a wealthy investment banker with whom Martha had a passionate fling, hoping he’d leave his fiancée for her. But when Martha ran into him at a party, fiancée on his arm, he pretended not to know her . . . Each time she met a man she liked, Martha heard wedding bells, and each time she suffered indignities and disappointment.”
Pasternak — who claims Stewart “had a surprising flexibility when it came to bedding down with a just-met mate” — describes her romantic encounter with a wealthy man dubbed “The Mogul.”
“That he immediately ceased returning her calls was not part of Martha’s script,” Pasternak writes. “Every rejection hit her hard . . . Each unanswered phone call ratcheted up her obsession. We spent entire East Hampton weekends hunting down The Mogul.”
Eventually, Stewart dragged Pasternak up to his door, only to be confronted by another woman: “Who knew what a man like The Mogul might do if he found himself pushed just a tad too far by Martha’s in-your-face desperation? Harassment. Trespassing. Stalking. Martha’s distress at her failed sentimental escapades made my heart ache.”
The book also details how Stewart was humiliated on a trip to Europe when she came face-to-face with a much younger rival for her then-boyfriend, billionaire Charles Simonyi, and her pain after her husband, Andy, left her for her former assistant.
Stewart’s rep declined to comment.