A daring murder at the Fresno, Calif., IRS Service Center kicks off Rupp’s novel of suspense, which inaugurates a series featuring debonair Dick Hartmann of the FBI’s San Francisco Violent Crime Squad. Despite the killer’s efforts to stage a suicide, the death of Edison Shaw, an IRS auditor, is quickly deemed a homicide, and Dick and his team, which he’s dubbed the Animals, are dispatched to the scene to investigate. They include the newest Animal, rookie agent Coleen Ryan, who makes a powerful impression on her new boss from the outset (“She has great pins that go all the way up to her ass and is well endowed upstairs. I don’t need this distraction at work, he thought”). The Animals try to establish the murderer’s motive by identifying the suspicious activities that Shaw was looking into at the time of his death. Their work leads them to a vicious street gang, the Bulldogs, and a fraud that raises red flags at the highest levels of government. Rupp keeps the twists coming. (BookLife)