Page 25 of Protected By West (San Antonio S.W.A.T. #1)

The phone rang as Tracy was heading back to her office and when she was close enough to hear it clearly, she picked up the speed of her steps and grabbed the phone before she sat down in her chair with a sigh. Swiping to accept the call, she smiled. "Mama! How are you?"

"Good... good! We just got to a stop on the cruise, and I wanted to give you a call."

"Where are you now?" Tracy had the itinerary at home, all over the front of her refrigerator, but couldn't think of where they were at the moment.

"Well, you've likely got the box of gifts we sent you from England."

"Yes, thanks! Loved that tea and jam from Highgrove. It was gone in a week."

"It was delicious when we tasted it. We went to Spain for a week and attended some kind of festival.

I wrote it down somewhere. And thank goodness Stan talked me out of trying the dances.

I would have broken my ankle! Now... we just got to our first stop on the European cruise.

" Her mom sighed with a smile, she could hear it.

"You sound good. A little out of breath. "

"I was walking back to my office when I heard your call." Tracy toed off one shoe and then the other, stretching out her legs under her desk. "So I did the hundred-yard dash in two-inch heels."

Her mother's maternal sigh made it feel like she was right there with her. "Two inches? Tracy... Do you want me to send you a catalog from that shoe company I buy from?"

"No, mama. I'm good."

"I know you think they're orthopedic-"

"Mom!" Tracy laughed out loud. "The store is called MIDWEST ORTHOPEDIC SHOE COMPANY!"

"That's just a selling point, but they look amazing!"

"I'm good, mama. Seriously though? I have my eye on a pair of Converse high tops. I hear you can have them customized with pictures on them. I'm thinking of putting the credit union logo on them."

The silence on the other end of the phone became a little unnerving after a few seconds.

"Mom?"

She heard some whispering and then.

"Tracy Louise Fagan, are you serious?"

"As a heart attack, Mama. I wore them in high school."

"And you'd always scribble on them."

"Sketch, Mama. I'd draw on them to personalize them."

"How's our girl doing?"

"Is that Stan? Send him my love?"

"Stan, hush... I'll ask her."

Tracy closed her eyes and listened to her mother and her husband talking on the other end of the call. It was always good to see them together. Or in this case, to hear them together. They were an amazing couple.

"Stan wants to know if you want us to bring you anything special from our stops on the cruise."

"Wine! Liquor! Oh, maybe-"

"A hot foreign guy?"

Tracy laughed along with her mom. It was exactly what they'd talked about when she'd picked them up to take them to the airport to fly across the Atlantic. At that point, she hadn't met Weston yet.

"You don't need to worry about sending me a guy, Mama, I-"

"Oh. My. Goodness! Did you... Stan! Get back here! Tracy, have you-"

"I'm dating a guy, Mama."

"Dating a guy..."

Tracy wished that her mother hadn't said it in the same wonder that Steve Irwin used to talk about observing wild species.

"My baby is dating a guy..."

"I'm a grown woman, Mama. And it's not unheard of for a woman of my age to date."

"Oh, Tracy, stop! I'm not saying you're old."

"Because I'm not."

"And I'm not saying it like it's that incredible-"

"Yes, you are, Mama. I know you don't mean it that way."

"No." She sighed softly and when she spoke again, Tracy could hear her mother's love pouring out of her words. "I don't. I... I'm just excited. Especially because I can hear how happy you are in your voice. I just want you to be happy like I am, baby."

Tracy chuckled a little.

Weston liked to call her Babe. Talk about a completely different context and meaning.

"So," Tracy could hear her mother's tone as if she was winding up for something big, "what does he do?"

"What does... what does he do?"

Oh shit.

Tracy's jaw dropped down a little.

She knew that question was going to happen.

How could it not?

"Well, we met at that conference I went to in Frederickson and-"

Stan's voice came through the phone. "Sorry, Tracy. The walking tour we signed up for is starting. We'll call you again, okay?"

"No problem, Stan! You two have a blast!"

"You know we will! Love you, Tracy!"

She heard her mom at the same time, calling into the phone. "Love you, sweetheart!"

And a moment after she sent her love to her mom the call ended.

She was so happy for her mom and Stan. They'd both just retired and had gone on what they called 'the trip of a lifetime.' She'd been thrilled when they told her about it and even more thrilled to see the photos they sent her.

Seeing her mom so happy after spending years so unhappy was really reassuring.

The phone on her desk pinged with an incoming message from another credit union phone. "Tracy?"

Tracy smiled at the laughter in her friend's voice. "What's up?"

Jaime's voice came back stronger. "Look out the window toward the counter."

Tracy pushed both of her bare feet against the ground and moved her chair so she could see out the window to the member service counter on the other side of the room.

Jaime was holding up a big pastry box with a grand smile on her face.

"We've got kolaches, girl!"

Okay then!

Tracy took a few steps forward and then remembered she had taken off her shoes leaving her feet in tights.

There was a moment where she considered going back to get her shoes and then another voice message came through the speaker. "They have apples in one, if you don't hurry-"

Well, screw the shoes!

Tracy opened her door and darted out into the lobby area of the credit union. As the front door swung open she slowed her feet and the corners of her mouth lifted in her workday smile. "Good morning, Missus Hinton and this is... Jeffrey or Jordan."

The little boy beside the older woman beamed with a smile that showed he was missing two teeth. "I'm Jeffrey!"

The FFs came out with more breath than they should have but missing his front teeth made it harder to pronounce. It was absolutely cute.

"I lost my teeth, Miss Fagan!"

"So you did, Jeffrey! You're growing up."

The little boy nodded, super proud. "Yep! My grams said I'm going to be taller than her any time now."

Tracy's smile broadened at that. "I bet you will. It seems every generation gets taller and taller."

Jeffrey looked at her with wide eyes. "Are you taller than your grams?"

"I didn't know my grandparents but I'm taller than my mom." She chuckled. "When I was a teenager my mom had to make me sit down so she could scold me. She told me it felt weird to scold me if she had to tip her head back."

Missus Hinton chuckled in her soft and gentle way. "I'll have to remember that for the future just in case I have to scold Jeffrey or his brother."

Jeffrey's mouth gaped open. "No way! Grams is never going to have to scold me. I'm a good boy!"

Tracy nodded. "I know you are."

Jeffrey put his hand in his shorts pocket and pulled out a Spiderman wallet. With a big toothless grin he opened the Velcro tab holding it closed. "I've got tooth fairy money, Miss Fagan! I'd like to posit it in my savings count."

Tracy nodded, translating his words into 'deposit it in my savings account.'

"We can certainly do that." She looked over to the counter and saw that Becca was at her computer. "Let's go over to Becca and-"

Jeffry was already making his way across the floor in a beeline for the open window.

Becca leaned over the counter and called out to the child. "Hey, Jeffrey! You want me to bring out the step for you?"

"Nope!" He called right back. "I've got this.

" And he did. The little boy was indeed growing.

He got up on the tip-toes of his Spiderman sneakers and got most of his face over the top of the counter.

A quick look in the security screen against the back wall showed that his nose was what was likely keeping him braced against the top of the counter as he reached his arm across the counter.

"I've got money, Miss Becca. Please put it in my Parachute Savings Account. Do you need the number?"

Becca shook her head. "I've got your account up, Jeffrey. No worries."

Jeffrey turned around and called out to his grandmother. "Grams! Miss Becca knows my account number!"

Tracy was walking across the carpeted floor and chuckled along with Jeffrey's grandmother.

"That's great!" His grandmother was the one who'd started savings accounts when each of her grandchildren were born. She'd even enrolled them in some of their Super Saver education classes that they held on every second Saturday of the month.

Missus Hinton did a few transactions of her own and then she left with her grandson, both smiling. And soon the lobby was quiet again.

Jaime walked over to Tracy, meeting her at the swinging gate that blocked public access to the area behind the counter. "Here. I saved you the apple one."

Tracy took the napkin in her hand and admired the golden brown outside of the pastry knowing the apple and cinnamony goodness that she'd find inside. "You're the bestest."

Jaime rolled her eyes but smiled at her friend. "You know it!"

Becca finished organizing her receipts and closed her drawer. "Did you guys hear about what happened at the Farmstead Credit Union a few blocks over?"

"Oh?"

Tracy had just taken a bite, or she would have asked the question that came from Pepper who stepped in from the Loan Office half a dozen feet away from them.

"What happened?"

Tracy turned to keep an eye on the door in case some members walked in, but she was just as eager as everyone else to hear the news.

Becca paused at the lower wheelchair accessible counter and pulled out her cell phone. "It was just posted in the Texas Credit Union group. One of the tellers unintentionally foiled a robbery."

Tracy took another bite and had to hold back a moan as the tingle of cinnamon on her tongue hit just the right way.