A Predatory Cabal: Worm in the Apple

by K.B. Pellegrino

Why is the West Side, Massachusetts suburban community minimizing the impact of murders of five wealthy and accomplished citizens? Is it a result of their 'putting their heads in the sand' in order to ignore the sexual revolution taking place in their beautiful city?
Perhaps the community disapproves of the victims. Their famous serial murder solver Captain Rudy Beauregard must face citizens who appear to be resistant to discussing lifestyle elements central to the murders. Lack of evidence and silence amongst those most closely involved with the victims are roadblocks. Beauregard believes firmly that in these particular series of murders, police gumshoe tactics versus forensic science will bring about solutions.
Captain Rudy Beauregard's detectives feel out of their element when five beautiful people are murdered in suburban West Side Massachusetts. The detectives discover the victims were participants in sexual forays; anathema to the broader elite community. As stated by all, "This is not NYC."
Captain Rudy Beauregard is looking for motives for the five murders. Four of the victims, one man and three women were considered 'La crème de la crème'. The fifth murder did not fit the profile for the other murders. The first four murdered appeared to be victims of their own pushing the sexual envelope for highs; highs he did not like. He wondered why those who had everything such as money, beauty, and prestige positions would seek pain as an aphrodisiac.
Why, just why, did they have to die? He wondered if sex was not the motive. Perhaps he could fall back on greed, power, and envy; his favorite motives for murder. Who is the sociopath/psychopath behind the killings? These were not serial murders. These murders were planned. The killer left little forensic evidence. Solving these murders required a deeper look inside the community and inside some of the detectives, themselves.

306 pages, Paperback

Published September 15, 2020

About the author

Stole crime novels from her father’s suitcase as a kid. Later, she served on the Board of the Springfield Police Commission as a Commissioner, worked as a political activist, and has twenty-years of service as a full-time professor in Business and Management. She holds a BS in engineering, an MBA, is licensed as a CPA and MA LCS and has left technical writing and business to pursue her love of plot and intrigue. She currently splits her time between Springfield and East Sandwich, Massachusetts.

In September 2022 K.B. Pellegrino's 7th book won the 2022 American Fiction Award for Beryl Kent and the Bleeding Man in the “Mystery/Suspense: Police Procedural” category.

K.B. Pellegrino's Killing the Venerable: It’s Their Time has been chosen as one of the NABE, The National Association of Book Entrepreneurs Pinnacle Book Achievement Award Winners for Summer 2022 in the mystery category.

In August of 2020 K.B. Pellegrino won the 2020 AMERICAN FICTION AWARDS in the Crime Procedural Category for Mary Lou: Oh, What Did She Do?

K.B. continues to write her mystery novels for all to enjoy.

Reviews

[Shawn McLaughlin]

Recommend it for the most awful list, no story, long definitions. It was highly recommended by others so kept hoping it would get better.

[Rachel Cacek]

Psychological thriller

A group of sexual deviates meet every week, enjoying their abhorrent needs. Then greed, lust, power take over and the murders begin.

[K.B. Pellegrino · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Predatory Cabal: Worm in the Apple (A Captain Beauregard Mystery) is in the mystery/suspense and police procedural genre. As in all Pellegrino's novels in this series, the detectives find multiple murders within different settings in fictional West Side suburbia. Although the victims participate in sado-masochism and related parties, the plot is the dilemma of police attempting to understand the lives of victims and then looking for motive, opportunity and weapon.