25. Vegarro “Vega” Moretti
VEGARRO “VEGA” MORETTI
Iwas sitting at the island in the kitchen doing my favorite thing, watching Sonnet do her thing at the stove. She was cooking breakfast. Glasses could throw down. She couldn’t just simply cook. She cooked with care. She cooked like feeding somebody meant something to her.
And she was doing all of that in a black cotton bra and panties. The set was plain, with no lace or fancy touches. Still, it turned into lingerie on her body. Her skin, curves, and hair pulled up messily while she flipped potatoes made me forget about how good the food smelled.
I loved that she loved to cook. But I hated why she was so good at it, though.
Sonnet hadn’t learned because a relative taught her family recipes.
She learned because nobody was there to make sure she ate when she was a teenager.
She learned because survival had forced her to figure out how to feed herself.
Now she cooked whatever she wanted because she finally could, and she did it with excitement.
“What did you actually do at work?”
She glanced over her shoulder with a questioning look, then put her attention back on the grits she was stirring.
“You mean Roman’s little file didn’t already tell you that?” she quipped with sarcasm.
I chuckled. “I know it had something to do with health informatics analyst and data analytics. But what the fuck is that?”
I watched her relaxed, almost distracted expression change as she thought of the answer. Her brows lifted slightly as her eyes brightened, like something inside her had just been lit up.
She turned the heat down under the grits and faced me with the spoon still in her hand. “Okay, so we handled surgical supply data, device tracking, inventory trends, vendor usage, and order patterns for hospitals and outpatient surgery centers.”
I chuckled dryly and she pointed the spoon at me. “Don’t laugh. It’s actually very interesting.”
“How, nigga?”
Her head tilted as her eyes narrowed at me. “Can you even say ‘nigga’? Ain’t that racist coming from you?”
“I’m half-black, asshole. It’s my mama’s side saying it.”
We started cracking up as I told her, “I was chuckling because you got excited as hell talking about the nerdy shit.”
“Because nobody ever asks me that.” She turned back to the stove, but her voice had more life in it now.
“People hear data and immediately check out, but it actually matters. Say a hospital keeps running out of a certain implant size or a specific surgical tray keeps getting delayed. That can mess up an entire surgery schedule. So, my job was to look at the numbers and figure out where the problem started before it became a bigger problem.”
I leaned back, watching her get worked up over hospital supplies while standing in my kitchen half naked. That shit was so fucking cute.
“I built dashboards, cleaned data, tracked usage patterns, and flagged inconsistencies. Like if a facility usually ordered twenty units of something every month and suddenly ordered two hundred, I had to figure out if it was a real demand shift, a mistake, or somebody entering data wrong.”
“You liked that?”
“I loved it. It was puzzles all day. Numbers tell on people. They expose habits, mistakes, waste, laziness, fraud, everything. People can lie, but data has a harder time keeping up with the lie.”
I grinned, while watching her. “You cute when you talk nerdy. You’re glowing.”
She tried not to smile and failed as she reached for my plate in the cabinet.
Roman’s file had given me her title, address, and routine, but it hadn’t told me that she lit up when she talked about solving problems. It hadn’t told me that she got excited over spreadsheets and catching mistakes before they cost people money or time.
It hadn’t told me my woman had built a life out of being useful, sharp, and needed, even after the world had given her every reason to stop trying.
That was the kind of stuff I wanted to know. Because Sonnet was mine now, and I wanted every piece of her story she was willing to give me.
“You want cheese on your eggs?” she asked.
“You know I do.”
My phone vibrated against the island with a notification of a text message from Jamir. I read the message from the drop-down notification without picking up the phone. As I read, I sat up straighter.
Roman is at 146th and Loomis. It’s an old body shop. It looks like his new product storage spot. Live ping came from a burner that connected to the Wi-Fi there three times this morning. Cameras nearby caught his driver’s truck outside twenty minutes ago. Move now or lose him.
I called Jamir, while sneaking peeks at Glasses’ booty jiggling as she moved around the stove making my plate.
“What’s up?” Jamir answered.
“How sure are you?”
“I’m positive. Roman’s people set up new Wi-Fi at the body shop this morning, but whoever did it used a phone I’ve already seen before.
That same phone connected to Roman’s car Bluetooth two weeks ago.
So the phone at that body shop is tied to one of Roman’s cars.
On top of that, street cameras caught his driver’s truck outside twenty minutes ago. This is not a guess, Vega. He’s there.”
I stood up so fast my stool scraped the marble floor. “Send everything.”
I hung up and Facetimed the group chat with Wise, Prodigy, Lux, and Lowe. They all answered within seconds of each other because they knew when we all got a call from one of us, it was time to get active.
“Meet me at the location I’m about to send,” I told them. “Roman is there now. Come ready.”
I ended the call and headed for the bedroom, without even realizing that I hadn’t acknowledged Sonnet. By the time I came back into the kitchen pulling on clothes, Sonnet stood near the stove next to my prepared plate. Her light skin had flushed pink and there were tears in her eyes.
When my shoulders slumped at the sight of her tears, she began to cry. “I don’t like this. I don’t want to lose you.”
I closed the space between us, held her waist, and then brought her body flush against mine. “I have to do this.”
Her lips trembled. “Please be safe.”
“Listen to me. You’re the reason I’m making sure I come back. I’m not going out there recklessly. I got this. I need to do this so you can live freely.”
Tears slipped down her face.
“Don’t do that,” I said, drying her cheeks with my thumbs. “Be strong for me. I can’t leave with you crying.”
She pulled in a shaky breath and nodded.
I kissed her once. Then again with soft little pecks until her breathing slowed.
“I’m coming back to you,” I said against her mouth. “Everything is gonna be okay.”
She nodded again, forcing herself to hold it together.
I kissed her forehead, ensured that my gun was secure in my waist, and walked out before staying became more tempting than killing Roman.
We sat down the street from the location Jamir sent, packed inside an old white van with fake plumbing decals on the side and rust around the wheel wells.
Wise sat in the passenger seat beside me. Prodigy, Lux, and Lowe were in the back.
Jamir had sent all the information we needed before we pulled up. We knew the complete layout of the inside and outside of the building. I had studied the floor plan until I could walk through the building with my eyes closed.
Roman had picked the body shop because it blended into the block.
Nothing about it stood out. Since it was a body shop, it made sense to the police that cars came in and out.
Men carried boxes and tools. Engines ran.
Music played. Nobody would question activity around a local, hood business.
Police wouldn’t think twice about men standing outside with dirty clothes and oil on their hands.
It sat on the corner of a busy residential block.
Kids played in the summer sun, running between parked cars while their mamas yelled from porches.
Men worked under hoods with shirts thrown over their shoulders.
Women sat outside talking on the phone. Somebody had a grill smoking in the front yard two houses down, and a group of old heads played cards at a folding table near the curb.
That made it easier for us to park there without drawing eyes. But it also made everything riskier.
I peered down the street toward the corner.
Two of Roman’s men stood near the garage door looking the part, but I knew they were Granger security.
They were wearing dusty work shirts and jeans.
One had a rag hanging from his back pocket.
The other held a clipboard he hadn’t written on once, since we parked.
Lux leaned forward, telling us all, “Only option is to roll up and air this bitch out. We have to get rid of the soldiers outside first to clear the path for Vega. Then he can go straight in for Roman. We’ll be behind him, catching anybody thumping.”
I kept my attention on the body shop. “He’s right. Outside has to go first. I’m going in for Roman. Y’all are my eyes. Anybody raises a gun toward me, drop them.”
Before I could respond, a UPS truck pulled up beside us. Every gun in the van turned toward that truck as the driver’s window rolled down.
Reek sat behind the wheel in a brown uniform with the hat pulled down and a smirk on his face. Saint leaned across the passenger seat, grinning like he had been waiting all day to see our reaction. Big A sat behind them.
Lux scoffed. “Man, y’all almost got smoked.”
Saint laughed. “By who? You? Please.”
As we all chuckled, Saint told us, “We here for backup. Y’all had our backs when we needed it. Today, we got your front.”
Big A nodded toward the body shop. “What’s the plan?”
I pointed to the building. “There are two outside near the garage door and one near the side entrance. Inside should be light. Jamir said it was only Roman, a few Granger men, and Promise. The storage room is the target. We hit outside first, then I go straight in. Y’all clear the way and keep eyes on my sides. ”
Saint checked his gun. “Simple enough.”