Author's Note: So, some of you might recognize this story, or at the least the premise for it, and that's because I posted a one-shot teaser for this story in my collection, Us Against Forever. I believe it's chapter two in that collection, and it's also called The Reluctant Queen. So if this seems familiar, that's probably why. Anyway, thank you all for the wonderful response to this! I'm glad that you are as excited to read it as I am to write it. I hope you like this chapter, and I look forward to hearing what you think!
Chapter One
Someone was screaming.
Well, not screaming, exactly - more like yelling enthusiastically. Felicity couldn't pick out any individual words, but she figured the sentiment was universal.
She flicked her eyes over her shoulder, to where John Diggle was standing. Purposely or not, the bodyguard had placed himself between her and the front door.
"Mother?" Felicity asked. "Angry girlfriend?"
Diggle gave her an appraising look. "Does it matter?"
She opened her mouth to answer, and then shut it with a barely audible snap. Despite what it must look like, and the situation that she had been forced into, Felicity didn't enjoy thinking that she might be upending any more lives than she already had. Oliver Queen was a businessman – whether he was in a boardroom or on a city street – and he had accepted the proposition she'd offered. She couldn't rationally be upset about that because of the very nature of its necessity, but she was distressed by the idea that there might be more players in this morbid drama than she'd allowed for.
Felicity could have said any of those things, but chose not to. Why would this man believe her? He certainly had no reason to, and the expression thinly veiled in his eyes told her that her words would be wasted anyway. John Diggle literally made his living from being suspicious and constantly on guard.
"No, I guess not," Felicity answered after a pause.
In truth, she wasn't in a position to let it matter. As long as Oliver kept up his end of the deal then it wasn't her problem.
The thought was a callous one, and she hated it; just like she hated that she'd left her mother alone in a parking garage on a dumpy side street of Vegas, and that she'd just bartered herself for services, as though she was a thing to be bought and sold.
Felicity hated everything about this, but her life, and her mother's life, hinged on whether or not she could make this plan work.
Had the stakes been any less, the tasks she was attempting to perform now would have been impossible.
A door opened somewhere deeper in the house, and then the yelling was moving inexorably closer.
A slight woman, thinner and slightly taller than Felicity, barreled into the foyer like a hurricane. She zeroed in on Felicity as if she was a hunter, and Felicity was her chosen meal.
Oliver appeared behind the woman just as she veritably dashed in Felicity's direction.
"Thea!"
For her part, Felicity took an automatic step backward and couldn't stop the small squeak of surprise that issued from her throat when she ran into a wall of hard flesh that could only be Oliver's bodyguard. Unable to retreat any further, she pulled her purse away from her side and positioned it against her stomach; a paltry excuse for a shield, or protection of any kind, but one couldn't be choosy when they were about to be eaten by a she-wolf.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" Thea snarled.
"Nobody," Felicity blurted. "I mean, I'm not nobody, I'm someone, obviously, and so are you."
Thea – at least, that was what Felicity thought Oliver had called her – stopped short. Her brown eyes widened and she puffed in annoyance before folding her arms over her chest. Her brown hair, long and wavy, settled around her shoulders like a cloud. Felicity thought that she was beautiful; or she would have been, anyway, if she wasn't standing less than five feet away and looking ready to tear into her.
Belatedly, Felicity realized that she had seen this young woman in pictures and news articles when she was researching Oliver: her name was Thea Queen, and she was Oliver's little sister.
"Great, glad that we've gotten that out of the way," Thea sneered.
"Thea," Oliver said warningly.
Felicity licked her lips nervously and tried to put some more distance between her and the other woman. Her effort was undercut by the fact that Diggle had not moved from behind her.
Thea noticed her attempt to move and for the barest second her expression morphed into something that looked less like anger, and more like … well, Felicity wasn't certain. Confusion, maybe, or even pity; the idea that it was the latter option, that she had given Thea Queen any reason to pity her, incensed Felicity. Immediately she straightened her shoulders and cleared her face of any discernible expression.
No one would make her cower.
Behind her, Diggle felt the sudden urge to smile.
"I'm Felicity Smoak. And you are?"
"Don't you mean Felicity Queen? And you already know who I am."
Felicity sidestepped the sarcasm in Thea's tone – and her quip about Felicity's last name - and made sure to keep hers neutral. "I do," she affirmed, "But I was trying to be polite."
The censure in her words was more effective for their lack of sting. Thea seemed young, closer to Felicity's age then to her brother's, and she looked caught between being annoyed at being chastised, and ashamed of her behavior.
Both of those things were ignored in favor of an angry tirade that she turned to direct at her brother.
"This is unbelievable, Ollie. You are unbelievable! This is a new low, even for you. You blow off dinner with me, again, and then when you finally show up it's to announce that you have a wife that you've just conveniently forgotten to mention!"
Felicity had been laid low by circumstance. The choices and situations that had driven her into Oliver Queen's office were not of her making, but she was powerless to escape them all the same; she had done much the same as Thea was doing now when she'd learned of the web that had ensnared her.
Underneath the fear and desperation; underneath the calculating and sometimes harsh persona that she might have to occasionally present; Felicity was still the same person at heart, and the same person that her mother had raised. She was soft, and, in some ways, still the vulnerable young woman that Thea Queen seemed to be.
Perhaps it was those realizations that drove her to action; perhaps it was the naked hurt and confusion in Thea's face, or the guilt that stood so starkly in Oliver's eyes that it was a wonder no one else seemed to notice it.
Whatever the reason, Felicity found herself advancing on Thea. She took a small handful of steps until the movement caught the other woman's attention, and didn't stop until Thea had turned her attention back to her.
Her words were dangerous and foolhardy, but Felicity spoke them anyway, because the underlying truth of her had not changed: she cared, and she was not someone who hurt other people needlessly.
Thea Queen was obviously hurt.
"It's not Oliver's fault," Felicity stated cautiously. "And it's not what you think."
Her words were greeted by silence.
"What do you -?"
Thea's question was cut off by Oliver's hand on her shoulder and a very pointed gaze.
"Now is not the time, Thea." His tone brooked no argument.
Thea tried anyway. "She clearly has something to say, Ollie."
"She's also spent the last seventy-two hours driving across the country, Thea. Whatever it is, it can wait."
"You can't just …"
"Thea." Oliver's tone was flat.
"Fine!" Thea acquiesced, throwing up her hands. Then, looking deliberately at Felicity, and then Oliver, "But this is not over."
Thea's footfalls out of the room were not as fast, but no less angry, than the ones that had brought her into the foyer. The moment she was out of sight all of the air escaped Felicity's lungs as if from a popped balloon; her shoulders sagged, and she was acutely aware of a vicious pounding behind her eyes.
"Are you all right?"
Had she been in a better state of mind, it would have occurred to Felicity to be surprised that the question had come from Oliver, and hinted at genuine concern.
That wasn't the case. "Oh, this is just my 'about to hack face'. Are there going to be any other family members for me to fend off in the next several hours, because I have to be honest, I don't think I have it in me to do that again."
"I apologize for my sister's behavior," Oliver began. "She can be a little hotheaded, and I'm afraid I picked a bad time to -."
"Drop a fake sister-in-law that she's never heard of in her lap?" Felicity finished for him. "I don't think there's a right time for that."
Oliver surveyed the woman in his foyer. The island had taught him a lot about the limits of the human body and consciousness, and he could tell by looking at Felicity that she was teetering near the edge of hers. She wasn't lying when she said she didn't have it in her to face another angry family member; Oliver doubted that she had it in her to do much of anything at the moment.
Still, he could admit – privately – that he admired her resolve.
"What would you have told her?"
"What?"
"Thea. What would you have told her, if I hadn't interrupted?"
"Oh. Only that you haven't done anything wrong, and that I'm not some flavor of the week trying to take advantage of her brother."
"Or the Queen family fortune," Oliver added.
"That's also true, but if you think that was her main reason for being angry, then you weren't paying attention."
Stunned, Oliver took a step forward and opened his mouth to shoot off a reply.
"Oliver." Diggle's voice was measured and firm, and it was the first time he'd spoken since Thea's arrival and subsequent departure.
Oliver snapped his mouth shut in silent acknowledgement. Diggle was just as observant as he was, and had undoubtedly come to the same conclusion over Felicity's state of near collapse. Whatever Diggle thought of the situation, and Oliver's agreement to go along with it, he was a naturally considerate person.
"We have a lot to talk about," he stated. "But that can wait until tomorrow. I'll show you to your room."
Oliver headed for the stairs and then stopped when another thought occurred to him.
He turned to Digg. "Raisa has a plate for you in the kitchen."
Diggle knew him well enough to pick up on the smile that wasn't quite there. The other man pursed his lips in his own version of a not-smile and nodded once before leaving.
Oliver had already turned and resumed his trek to the stairs, so he missed the way Felicity's brow furrowed at the exchange.
He didn't speak as he led Felicity down the mansion's wide halls. Her footsteps dragged across the carpet, an audible reminder of the exhaustion that must be eating away at her. Oliver slowed his pace. Thea was always getting on him about how fast he walked and how impossible it was for anyone who wasn't six feet tall to keep up with him.
Oliver had used the drive home to contemplate some of the more easily solved predicaments of this situation. The sleeping arrangements had been one of the first issues he'd resolved.
He stepped into the empty bedroom next to his. Felicity trudged in behind him.
"This will be your room," he informed her. "The en-suite bathroom is over there. It should be stocked with fresh towels."
Felicity nodded. She scanned the room and briefly entertained the idea of telling him how beautiful it was, but Felicity wasn't certain that she had the energy to carry on a conversation. She was well and truly drained.
Then she caught sight of another door, set into the wall opposite the bed. It was standing open.
"Where does that go?"
"My room."
He'd said the words casually, but he watched her closely for a reaction. The only one she gave was the brush of her shoes over the carpet as she moved around him and closed the door.
Oliver actually smirked when he heard the deadbolt click into place.
"Is that really necessary?" He couldn't resist.
The gravity behind her answer took all the humor out of him. "Better safe than sorry."
An irrational anger seized him. Oliver did not fool himself into thinking that he was someone else: he was a hard man, and he'd done things over the years that still kept him awake at night; his hands were not clean. Despite those things, he was not cruel, and he did not tolerate the cruelty of others.
He was, at heart, a protector - a guardian.
Something, he was being given to understand, that Felicity Smoak had not had the benefit of.
"That door only locks from this side," Oliver informed her. "The same goes for your bedroom door. Raisa has a set of keys if you lock yourself out."
"Okay." Felicity nodded.
Oliver was halfway out of her room when he turned back to address her. "Felicity?"
"Hmm?"
She looked at him from behind glasses that had started to slip down her nose; her hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail, but the ends were curled and rested on one shoulder; her lips, painted magenta, offset the pale cream of her blouse. Panda bears smiled at him from the tops of her shoes.
Everything about Felicity was innocuous – pleasant, even. This was clearly not the life and situation that she had been born into or brought up in, so why was she in it now? And why, for the love of all things sane, had Oliver ever let her blackmail him into this scheme?
"We made a deal: your technical skills, for my protection."
"I know. So?" Felicity replied.
"So, I never said I'd only protect you from your father."
That was not what she'd been expecting to hear. "Oh."
Oliver was not a man of many words, but he found himself speaking again anyway. "I don't know where you've been, Felicity, but you're here now. And here is safe."
Tears sprang to her eyes. She had no idea who this man was, not really, and that hadn't stopped her from barging into his office and attempting to blackmail him into pretending to be her husband. She had cajoled him, begged him, and threatened him (albeit in a rather roundabout way); yet, for whatever reason, Oliver Queen had agreed to help her – a woman he didn't know, and had every reason to mistrust. They had made a deal. A business transaction had taken place only hours ago, and the only questions that Oliver had asked pertained directly to what they were attempting to pull off.
Now, sequestered in the bedroom next to his in his family's mansion, he was offering her something that she'd never expected: kindness.
A tear slipped down her cheek. "I … uh …"
Oliver grabbed her doorknob. "Don't forget to lock it."
Then he pulled the door closed and disappeared down the hall.
