"Family isn't always blood. It's the people in your life who want you in theirs; the ones who accept you for who you are. The ones who would do anything to see you smile and who love you no matter what." ~ Anonymous

. . .

This was why seatbelts were invented.

And never in her life was she happier that she'd buckled hers properly. It was cutting into her shoulder and waist, but it was well worth it. It was then that she realized that the airbags had also gone off.

Had she been unconscious at some point?

Felicity didn't remember the airbags going off… She groaned as she tried to move. She really did hurt. It wasn't just where the seatbelt was sure to have bruised her. What had happened? It was all a blur…of darkness, car lights, and cold.

She looked around and realized that her car had flipped and she was hanging upside down in her car. Felicity pulled in breath and then slowly let it out. Stay calm, she tried to tell herself. It was late, she'd been on her way to Verdant (and the Foundry) after going home to change and get a quick bite to eat first. Next time, she obviously needed to take Diggle up on his taco dinner offer. She wasn't far from the road, she could hear cars going by, but there really wasn't much light around. Reaching up, she tried to unbuckle her seatbelt. It wouldn't release. She groaned and started to feel her pockets for her cell phone. It wasn't in her jacket pocket anymore.

"Crap," she mumbled.

Diggle and Oliver would wonder where she was, she was certain, but how long would that take? They could locate her using her phone, but she hoped that a somewhat kind person would at least call about there being an accident. She froze when she heard something.

"Hello?" she called out with some hope.

Silence.

Felicity frowned. This was going to be a long night if this was her luck. She tried to feel around for something to free her. She knew that she should have invested in one of those seatbelt cutters…though really, where would it be right now? Most likely hanging out with her cell phone. Fabulous.

Crunch.

She was quiet and waited and then she heard it again. Was she just hallucinating or was someone there? Felicity looked around and then would let out a small yelp from the pain. Her left side hurt the most, likely because that had been the side that her car had been hit on.

"Hello?" she tried again.

"Oh, you're still alive…"

Felicity just stared in both shock and terror. Moira Queen stood there in the darkness that lay beyond her broken car. She looked quite disappointed. She'd been told that there would be repercussions for telling Oliver who Thea's father was. Apparently killing her was on Mrs. Queen's list of ways to make her world right.

"I—I was—Oliver—" she mumbled as she tried to think of what she could really say to that. "Why?" Felicity finally blurted out. She reached down and madly pressed on the seatbelt release button. It stubbornly didn't cooperate.

"Do you really have to ask such a stupid question?" she asked.

This was it.

She knew that Moira Queen had been involved with Malcolm Merlyn and The Undertaking, but this…this was something more. Felicity had always thought that Moira was innocent in the part of knowing that the Queen's Gambit was knowing down, thus killing Robert Queen (and they thought Oliver). She also had never actually thought that Moira would willingly let Walter Steele be involved in it; it did end up ending her marriage with him after all. She had never really thought of her as a cold-blooded killer, not until now.

A gun was raised and Felicity just stared back.

This was it.

This really was the end.

Felicity had thought about death more and more since joining Team Arrow, but in all honesty…this wasn't one of the ways that she'd thought of. Of course she hadn't really thought that Moira Queen would kill her, obviously she hadn't thought about any of that lately.

"Please…" she whispered.

She remembered talking to Oliver at the rally for Moira Queen for Mayer…when she told him about Thea. She remembered how she'd gone on about her family and how she was afraid of losing him. Even though Felicity wasn't close with her mother and obviously her father, she suddenly wished that she had at least a moment to reach out. To tell them that she'd done okay in life. To tell them that her life had had meaning, even if it had just been for a while.

Wasn't that what most people wanted?

For their life to have meaning?

To be remembered?

To be something more than another person?

Felicity felt like she'd done that.

"Don't worry," Moira told her. "Oliver will move on without you… He's got Laurel…Sara…and practically every other woman in the world to make him forget you. It will be easy. Oliver doesn't need much to get him into bed and infatuated… I'll hire another assistant… That might hurry things along…"

"You don't know him," she blurted out.

"You little bitch!" Moira said as she lowered the gun. She approached the car and was suddenly using the butt of it to smack Felicity in the side of the head. "You think you know my son just because you opened your legs for him?! Ha! Plenty of women have done that!"

The world spun. Felicity blinked her eyes and she suddenly started to struggle with keeping her eyes open. The sound of sirens bounced off her mind and the red and blue lights could be seen from where she was.

"Damn it."

She wasn't paying attention to Moira anymore. If she was going to shoot her, then she was going to shoot her. At least the police would find her sooner rather than later… She supposed that that was sort of comforting.

Felicity waited.

Nothing.

A sob rang out from her lips. She hurt and the pounding that had started in her head wasn't helping things. Felicity was barely keeping the darkness back. She didn't want to pass out.

"Oliver," she mumbled.

Her body ached and her head pounded. Her eyes slid closed and she listened. It was all she could do as she slowly slipped towards unconsciousness.

"Quentin! I'm so glad you're here! I found the poor girl in the car… I tried to reach in to get her, but I can't get her out… There's glass everywhere."

"Relax, the fire and rescue are on their way."

She heard them approaching the car. Felicity desperately wanted to open her eyes and yell to Lance. She wanted to tell him that Moira the reason she was there. Instead, a sob escaped her lips.

"Help is here, Ms. Smoak… Hold on."

"We're not going to leave you."

. . .

Felicity had laid there, pretending to be asleep for some time. From her understanding, they really couldn't do much until swelling had gone down. So, they'd stabilized her left arm and her left leg. She didn't know if they were broken or if it was just a precaution since that was the side of the car that was hit. She'd listened to countless conversations that just made her scream.

"Mrs. Queen. I just wanted to let you know that the doctor will be along in about an hour to reassess Ms. Smoak."

"Oh good, thank you so much. I want to make sure that she receives the best care."

"Of course, Mrs. Queen. Is there anything I can get you? Water? Coffee?"

"Coffee would be great, if it's not too much trouble. I didn't want to leave her side."

"Of course it's no trouble… I'll be right back."

"Thank you."

She was far too afraid that Moira would try to finish the job if she knew that she was awake. But why hadn't she already? Was this part of her plan? Of some kind of twisted plan? Or had she just not thought this far ahead? Felicity was sure that the police showing up hadn't been apart of the plan. She remembered Lance's voice, Felicity was sure that he'd hung around the hospital for a while. Maybe he was the reason why Moira was waiting.

The door opened again and Felicity prepared to bite her tongue through another fake exchanged between Moira and the nurse. She figured that Moira had to have told the staff that she was her son's assistant and then lathered on the fake layer that she cared about Felicity and that Oliver would be devastated to lose such a good employee or something.

"The nurse said this was for you."

Oliver's voice almost made her open her eyes. She made herself keep them closed though. She needed to wait. She didn't want to have any discussion with Moira in the room. She didn't need the glaring eyes looking her way. Felicity was fairly sure that Moira already knew that she'd tell Oliver the truth. She always told Oliver the truth.

"Oliver, Lance said he called you, but I didn't know—"

"He called me. I'm here. Now you can go."

"Oliver—"

"Lance also said that Felicity's car crash wasn't an accident."

"No, it looked like someone slammed into her from the side."

"Mom?"

"I didn't do it, Oliver… Why would I do such a thing?"

"You might blame Felicity—"

"Of course, I do! That doesn't mean I'd run her off the road with my car… You can have Quentin come down to the house with you and you can look over all of the vehicles there…"

Silence.

"You still don't believe me?"

"Why were you there, Mom?"

"Thea invited Walter and I down to the club... I was just on my way there. I happened to see that there was an accident and no one else was stopping. You wouldn't believe how many people just drove by, Oliver… What kind of a world are we coming to? No one stops and helps anymore."

Silence.

"You can call Thea and Walter if you don't believe me. I called them on the way here…"

"I will."

"Of course you will. Your love struck assistant digs up dirt on me to give to you and suddenly you'll believe the absolute worst of me… Maybe you should be looking into her past and seeing if she doesn't have skeletons in a closet somewhere."

"This isn't about Felicity's past."

"Maybe it should be."

"I know you don't like her because she told me the truth, but that doesn't make her a bad person. That makes her a good person. She tells the truth. It's nice."

"Truth isn't all the rage that you think it is, Oliver. You wait until there's something out in the world that you wish that you could keep secret. I'm not a perfect person. I've made more mistakes than I can tell you. I've made unpopular decisions, but they were all made for a reason. Maybe one day you'll understand…"

"Thank you for making sure that Felicity received medical care."

"Fine. If this is really how you want things to be between us, Oliver… But know that this is because of her… I lost five years with my son… I just want to be your and Thea's mother. I'll give up running for mayor and anything else if that means that I can be back in your life."

"I told you. We don't have a relationship anymore."

"If only your father could see you now…"

Silence.

"Do you really think he'd be proud?"

Silence.

And Felicity assumed she left because she heard the door again. Oliver let what sounded like frustrated sigh. She waited a moment, listening as he scooted the chair to her bedside and sat down.

"How are you feeling?"

She knew that he knew. Oliver always knew. He could probably hear her breathing and know that it wasn't low enough to be sleeping. Felicity wondered if he understood why she'd been pretending to sleep. If he understood her fear.

"Sore," she whispered as she slowly opened her eyes.

"My mother—"

Felicity stared at him for along moment. The room was dim, but there was still light. She frowned. "You've been crying…" She wondered if he knew how bad he looked. She saw a lot of 'bad' when it came to Oliver, but emotional was not something she often saw, so it concerned her more than normal.

"You're the one lying here in the hospital bed and you're worrying about me?" he asked with a smile.

Her eyes didn't move from him. "I always worry about you."

"I thought I'd lost you…" he whispered and looked right at her. His voice normalized again after a moment. "Diggle couldn't find any cameras along there, but he managed to get a hold of photos taken at the crash site. I guess the digital age helps that."

"My car's totaled…"

"I'm going to buy you a new one with the best safety rating."

She smiled a little. "It was leased."

"We'll sort it out later."

Felicity closed her eyes and wanted to roll onto her side to face him, but her leg and arm were confined. Swelling sucked. She really hoped that nothing was broken. How was she supposed to do any of her jobs if her leg and arm were broken?

"Are you going to tell me what happened?"

"A car hit me," she said slowly.

"My mother was there."

"I don't think she actually hit me," Felicity told him. It made her a little sad thinking about the end of Oliver's conversation with his mother. As much as she distrusted Moira Queen, she was still his mother. Everyone deserved to have family and Oliver had already lost too much of it. "Her hair was too perfect when I saw her."

"You saw her?"

"I was stuck in the car. Upside down. Strapped in."

"And…she helped you?"

"I'm sure she would have put it that way," Felicity said as she reached up next to where her left eye was. She was sure that it was seriously bruised. She hadn't gotten a hold of a mirror, but she wouldn't be surprised if she even had a black eye from it.

"How—"

"She was going to kill me…and then Lance showed up," Felicity told him. "I blacked out, but I remember her acting like she'd stopped to help me."

"You should—"

"I'm not telling Lance," Felicity replied quickly.

"Felicity—"

"Oliver."

They stared at each other for a long while before either spoke again. As scary as it sometimes was, she always knew that she could tell Oliver the truth. That she could tell him the truth about everything. Maybe he'd get mad for a moment, but he never stayed mad at her because it was always the truth and he always needed to hear it.

"You don't need to lose anyone else," she whispered. "When I told you about Thea… I didn't mean for you to lose your mother…"

"That's not your fault," he told her in the gentlest of tones.

"I don't have a great relationship with my family," Felicity said. "But you were always so happy with yours… I've seen the pictures in your house before the Queen's Gambit… I've seen the ones when you got back… They might be different family pictures, but you all looked so happy…"

"Things were happier before the Undertaking…"

"Thea's going to notice."

"I'm going to try to keep that from happening."

She could hear the determination in his voice. Felicity just didn't know if what was going on was right. "Think of Thea—"

"I am," he snapped and then immediately softened as he closed his eyes. Felicity knew that he didn't mean it. "I'm sorry…"

Felicity's voice was soft and gentle as she spoke. "Thea's lost a lot… She lost her father, she lost you…and got you back, but still felt like you were lost…she lost Walter, she thought she was going to lose her mother… Do you really think she can cope with realizing that the Queen family is broken?"

He stared at her for a long moment. "I don't know what else to do."

"I'm really not defending your mother," Felicity told him. "Not after she held me at gunpoint and smacked me with it…" That sort of just all tumbled out of her mouth and she saw Oliver's reaction.

"Gunpoin—"

"I'm just saying that Thea doesn't deserve to be put through all of that. You're good at keeping secrets. Something you and your mother have in common," she rambled and then stopped and stared at him to see if he was going to take offense. "I'm just saying… Maybe you just need to take a breath when it comes to your family…"

"Blood isn't the only thing that makes family, Felicity."

"I know," she whispered as she stared at him. She knew that. She did. For a long time, she'd thought of Diggle and Oliver as her family. She also thought of Thea like a little sister and Roy even as part of the family even before he became part of Team Arrow. Felicity would often keep an eye on Verdant when she was in the Foundry and just make sure that it seemed like Thea was okay. She'd never told Oliver, though; afraid he might find it slightly odd or creepy. Team Arrow had grown suddenly. Roy had been brought into the fold because it was the only way and Felicity had high hopes that they'd really be able to help him. That wasn't all though, Sara Lance had returned and currently was planning on remaining in Starling City. So, they'd welcomed her. It was still something to get used to. It used to just be the three of them. "You're my family…"

He smiled at her, really smiled at her then. He leaned in and carefully pressed a kiss to her forehead. It wasn't a quick one. His lips stayed there for a long moment. She savored it. Felicity wished that she could save that moment forever, to experience it any other time.

"I told you before, you're not going to lose me," he whispered against her forehead.

. . .

TBC…