Cookware Center

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.Chapter One

“I travel a lot; I hate having my life disrupted by routine.”—Caskie Stinnett

Whoa! Who’s that?” Jordan asked, leaning over to pick up the newspaper he’d just knocked off the kitchen table en route to the refrigerator. “She’s actually hot!”

Mallory Marlowe glanced up from the coffee mug that up until that moment had been the focus of her attention. She assumed that the female who had aroused such a strong reaction in her eighteen-year-old son would turn out to be a fellow member of the Star-of-the-Month club, a lot of actress or singer who was as well known for flaunting her curves as she was for her talent.

So as soon as she saw the face staring back at her from the front page of the New York Times Style section, she gasped.

“Oh, my gosh!” she cried. “I know her!”

” ‘Carly Cassidy Berman,’ ” Jordan read aloud. “She developed a heap of magic potion that makes humans young again. Or so she claims.”

“Let me see that.”

Mallory reached for the newspaper, still marveling if someways she was mistaken. Yet there was Carly Cassidy, staring right back at her from page one, wearing the same cat-that-ate-the-canary grin she’d worn when she’d been crowned Homecoming Queen. In full color, no less.

“You genuinely know her?” Jordan asked as he retrieved a carton of orange juice from the refrigerator.

“I sure do,” Mallory replied. “We went to JFK High together. Everybody knew her. In fact, she was voted Most Likely to Succeed.”

“Cool.” Jordan plopped down in the seat opposite hers. “She looks amazing—for someone your age, I mean. Maybe that crazy potion of hers actually works.”

Mallory had to agree that that was a definitive possibility. From the picture, it looked as if wrinkles, not to mention cellulite, had failed to stake a assert for the duration of the past two and a half decades. In fact, Carly didn’t look much older than she had in high school.

True, her hairstyle had changed. Gone were the long, silky tresses that as a teenager she was evermore flipping over her shoulder. While her hair was still just as blond and still just as silky, these days it was cut into a elaborated set of layers. It curved around her face in such a flattering way that it looked as if a stylist had meticulously arranged each person strand.

Her face had likewise changed since her days of shouting “Who’s your worst en-e-my? John F. Kenn-e-dy! Go-o-o, Bulldogs, go!” on the football field each Saturday. But while her girlish prettiness was gone, it had been substituted by a womanly beauty that was at least as striking.

All in all, there was no mistaking that the woman pictured on the front page was without doubt Carly Cassidy, apparently now known as Carly Cassidy Berman. After taking a strong sip of her coffee, Mallory begun to read.

Enterprising Entrepreneur
Bottles the Waters
of the Fountain of Youth

Can drinking a magic potion twice a day turn back the hands of the clock? Carly Cassidy Berman thinks so. So do the thousands of believers who have been scrambling to snatch Berman’s creation, Rejuva-Juice, off the shelves at health feed stores all over the country.

They’ve likewise been flocking to Berman’s chichi spa, Tavaci Springs, it is name derived from the Native American Ute tribe’s word for “sun.” She opened it less than a year ago in tony Aspen, Colorado, well known as an enclave of the financially and physically fit. Local residents and visitors similar not only endure a six-month wait for a reservation; they likewise recompense upwards of fifteen hundred dollars a day for the privilege of staying at this mountain hideaway that combines the rustic parts of a former silver mining town with an array of touchy-feely New Age accoutrements. The hefty price tag enables guests to imbibe unlimited quantities of the pricey potion, as well as to indulge in facials, massages, body wraps, and even mud baths that incorporate the same ingredients that reportedly make Rejuva-Juice “plastic surgery in liquid form.”

But fans of Rejuva-Juice say it’s much more than Botox-in-a-bottle. Its devotees insist that it also significantly increments both their energy level and their mental powers.

The secret, according to the elixir’s creator, is the distinctive ingredients, which Berman claims have never before been available. The determined enterpriser expended two years journeying around the world, trekking to remote villages in such locales as the Himalayas in Nepal, the rain forests of South America, and the tropical islands of the South Pacific. Her mission was to learn regarding the herbs, roots, and other substances that primitive peoples have used for centuries to improve their well-being and increase their life span.

As for the formula employed to make this magical potion, the wizard behind it has no intent of divulging it.

“That’s a mystery I’ll take to my grave,” jokes Berman, who is forty-five but looks at least a decade younger, making her a walking advert for her product’s effectiveness. “Some of Rejuva-Juice’s constituents are already well known, such as acai berries and goji juice. But others, the ones that actually make it so amazingly effective, were never available in this country before. That is, until I expended two years slogging through mud and climbing mountains and paddling down rivers to reach the most isolated spots in the world. I was determined to track down these miracle ingredients and fetch them back home with me.”

Mallory stopped reading long sufficient to take another sip of coffee. Oddly enough, it of a sudden tasted like some of that mud Carly Cassidy had slogged through en route to fame and fortune.

She skimmed the rest of the article, which interwove experts’ dismissals of Rejuva-Juice’s purported gains with quotes from numerous of it is die-hard fans, including a few movie stars who were household names. When she reached the end, she sighed loudly and folded the newspaper in half, coincidentally removing Carly’s face from view.

Mallory did her best to muster up good sensations in regards to her former acquaintance’s success. After all, she had not one thing versus her, isolated from the mild case of jealousy that all of a sudden reared it is ugly head, momentarily making her feel as if she was back in high school.

Involuntarily, she glanced down at her ratty pink bathrobe, a gift from her daughter long before she’d even started college. In fact, she seemed to do not forget that it dated back to the time when Amanda still believed in Santa Claus. As if the robe’s fraying cuffs and threadbare chenille weren’t causing sad feelings of gloom and inadequacy enough, she was likewise wearing the bottom halves of what had once been her son Jordan’s pajamas. After the seam had ripped along the thigh, he’d deemed them too shabby to stay part of his working wardrobe. Mallory’s standards weren’t rather as high.

As for the T-shirt that finished her outfit, it had once belonged to her husband. Her reason for hanging onto this queer item was rooted more in emotion than practicality or laziness. Less than two years had passed since David had died. The shock of learning that he had plummeted from the balcony of a high-rise hotel had been bad enough. But her subsequent invention that his death might have been the result of foul play—and her realization that she would never know the whole truth—haunted her at least as much.

Stumbling upon an stimulating new occupation just a few months earlier had likewise gone a long way in helping her get her life back together. She’d never expected to find herself writing travel articles, much less writing them for a well-respected modus vivendi magazine like The Good Life. But when a friend at the local newspaper here in the New York City suburb of Rivington commended her for the job, she all of a sudden found herself embarking upon a whole new chapter of her life.

Mallory realized that all things considered, she’d been fortunate. Yet as she sipped her coffee, she couldn’t aid comparing her own life to Carly Cassidy’s. She supposed it wasn’t surprising that the two of them had ended up going off in such dissimilar directions. After all, they hadn’t precisely started out their lives in the same way. The in an outstanding manner pretty, perky, and usual Carly had not only been Homecoming Queen and captain of the cheerleading squad, she had likewise been class president for the duration of both their junior and senior years. And the year their hometown had held it is primary and only apple festival, she had been chosen Miss Red Delicious. Mallory, meanwhile, hadn’t even made it into the semifinals for Miss Granny Smith.

She had to confess that according to her recollection, she hadn’t in truth minded. Mallory was one of those humans who never felt specially comfortable being in the spotlight—even when surrounded by a dozen other varieties of fruit.

In fact, the long-ago apple festival highlighted how dissimilar the two of them were. It was no wonder Carly had built a spectacularly successful career based largely on her natural flair for glamour and self-promotion.

It occurred to Mallory that she might undertake getting in touch with her one of these days. Even even though they hadn’t precisely traveled in the same circles, catching up on old times might be fun. She likewise welcomed the chance to satisfy her curiosity when it comes to what Carly’s life was genuinely like—the glowing New York Times report aside.

She was adding “Google Carly Cassidy Berman” to her mental To Do list when Jordan picked up the newspaper and commented, “I think it’s cool that you recognise somebody so famous—and so hot.”

“Who’s hot and famous?” Mallory’s daughter asked as she bounded into the kitchen.

“That’s for me to recognise and you to find out,” Jordan replied, his sister’s arrival without any delay causing him to regress at least ten years.

Unlike eighteen-year-old Jordan, whom no one could ever accuse of being a morning person, Amanda was as sunny as the bright yellow paint on the walls. W…