Volume two of The King Trilogy, The Tainted Trust, is a moving, action-packed thriller as well as a brilliant depiction of what perfectly normal people will do for love and money. It is the continuing story of an inconvenient fortune and its catastrophic impact on a loving family.

No one wept when Jim Servito died. He left an estate amounting to $325,000,000 when his wife, Karen, killed him in Caracas. He had accumulated the fortune the old fashioned way: He stole it from the US and Canadian governments using a brilliant gasoline tax-evasion scam. The money is hot, deposited in a Cayman Island bank, and it's cursed. It has a profound effect on everyone who touched it. It is managed by Alfred Schnieder, an aging and unscrupulous Caracas banker.

Mike King, the love of Karen's life and a man nearly ruined by the Feds' scorched-earth efforts to recover Servito's fortune, convinces her to keep the money instead of returning it to its rightful owners. With the assistance of Schnieder, they form The King Trust - a near fatal mistake. The desperate Feds continue to spare no expense and effort to recover the money. Phillip, the only child of Karen and Jim Servito, assumes he is the natural heir to his father's fortune - and he has his own greedy plans for the money. Aging Alfred Schnieder relinquishes the trust's management to Louis Visconti, a 32-year-old Wall Street whiz kid and brilliant financial engineer.

Kerri Pyper, Mike King's 23-year-old estranged daughter, has not seen or communicated with her father since she was nine. She discovers the existence of The King Trust and is shocked to learn that her natural father is its Trustee. Visconti, desperate and assuming he is still the smartest man in the room, embezzles the fortune and flees to Monaco. He made only two mistakes: He deceived both Mike King and Alfred Schnieder, and he fell in love with Kerri.