THE TAINTED TRUST (Volume 2 of The King Trilogy)

CHAPTER 62

         Refreshed, she joined Visconti in the kitchen.

Now dressed in a red velour track suit, no shoes or socks, he was busily engaged in the preparation of a large jug of ice cubes, orange juice and vodka. He waved and smiled, then resumed his focus on the contents of the jug. He poured the entire concoction into a blender, held the cap on top with one hand and plugged the machine in with the other. When he was certain the blender had done its job, he turned it off and filled two crystal wine glasses with the finished product. "I'm sure there's an official name for this," he said as he handed one of the glasses to Kerri. "I call it a vodka slushy. I hope you like it as much as I do."

Kerri took a minuscule sip, then licked her lips. "Delicious. I can't even taste the vodka." She took a larger sip to confirm her initial report.

"Then I've done it right." Visconti pointed to the bar. "Let's sit up there and talk." He helped Kerri climb into one of the white upholstered captain's chairs, then hoisted himself into the one beside her.

"Do you mind answering a personal question?" Kerri asked.

"Hell no. Go ahead."

"How did you get so rich?"

"I don't really know...I guess it was because I hated being poor. Maybe I was just lucky." He gave Kerri a mischievous grin. "How would you define luck?"

"Let me think about it," Kerri said, then drank more of her slushy. "I think luck is a fortuitous event."

"Very good," Visconti said, then poured another drink for himself and refilled Kerri's. "Do you have any idea when luck occurs?"

Kerri giggled, unaware that alcohol had begun to affect her. "That's a tough one. Give me some more time."

"Take all the time you need."

"...I think luck occurs when preparation meets opportunity."

"Brilliant! I couldn't imagine a better way to express it. Do you think it's impossible for luck to occur without a collision of those two factors?"

"I don't really know. I think luck is a subjective thing. One person might think he's lucky to be alive. Another person takes his health for granted and never thinks about it."

Visconti nodded. "Maybe you have to consider the degree of preparation and the size of the opportunity."

"Why?"

"Somewhere along the path of a healthy individual's existence, he must have prepared himself for the opportunity to survive."

Kerri nodded, then took another sip.

"We could carry the argument to the infinite level of resolution, but that's not why I introduced it. I did it because I wanted to give you a better answer to your first question."

"Okay," Kerri said, then took another long sip. "What was my first question?"

"How did I get so rich."

"Right. How did you?"

"For the longest time in my life I considered myself unlucky to have been born to poor parents. Later, I thought I was unlucky not to have married into wealth. When I finally stopped feeling sorry for myself, I realized that the only way I was ever going to be wealthy was to prepare for it. So I did."

"How did you prepare for it?" Kerri asked, fascinated.

"Most people who knew me thought I had the world by the tail, a lovely wife, a good education and a great job with Green-Waltrum, one of the biggest houses on the street. They were wrong. The world had me by the tail. It was confiscating every dime I could make, and I knew it would continue to do so unless I got off the treadmill. I think that was the beginning of my preparation. The opportunity came when Gerry Mara and Allen Greisdorf invited me to fly with them. At that very moment, an opportunity collided with preparation. The rest is history. We started managing other peoples' money at a time when it was like taking candy from a baby." Visconti refilled Kerri's glass. "You could say I was lucky."