Darren set a Lightnin’ Hopkins record on the turntable, a guitar-picking blues that made Buddy Watson roll his eyes and groan. But this was a rule they’d established early on: whoever hosted got to control the music and set the menu. Tonight was barbecue, but Ricky’s wife had sent tamales anyway. Warming in the oven, they filled the house with a smoky sweetness as their corn husks browned and pork fat dripped and sizzled. Of the roughly one hundred and fifty Texas Rangers commissioned by the state, the six of them in no way represented all of the department’s diversity, but they were the few willing to admit the job got a hell of a lot easier if you had like minds to shoot the shit with. Five men—three black, two Latino—and one white woman who had joined this unofficial fraternity out of solidarity. A second white woman, Vicki Brennan, one of the original members of their social club, had stopped answering their e-mails after the election.

As soon as the drinks were poured, the speculation began.

“What’s gotten up her butt?” Patricia said.

“Scared, probably,” Ricky said. He was wearing a black sweatshirt and matching Wranglers, and he’d downed two beers before he took a seat.

Roland made a face. “You really think she voted for him?”

“It shouldn’t matter,” Ricky said. “Not to this here.”

He meant the people at the party, the friendships they’d forged. But Patricia huffed and shook her head. “Oh, it matters,” she said. She was the youngest at twenty-six, having made Ranger just eight years out of the academy. A former ball player at Sam Houston State, she was nearly as tall as Darren, blond with a long face and strangely delicate features. She licked the salt off her glass.

“Vicki got her eye on headquarters, moving up the ranks,” Roland said. “We’re not liable to see her at one of these deals again.” He pinched snuff from a tin he kept tucked in the front pocket of his shirt and balled it under his tongue.

Hector nodded his shaved head. “She’s always been one of them,” he said.

He didn’t clarify who them was. But they all nodded their heads anyway.