Oliver paused outside the familiar IT Department door and took a deep breath.
I will win this round, he told himself.
He squared his shoulders and sauntered in to her office with all the playboy egotism he could muster. She immediately noticed him.
"And here I was beginning to think my days of being Oliver Queen's personal computer geek had come to an end," she said quickly as she set her take out carton down and straightened papers on her desk.
Oliver watched with...what did he feel? Pride?
Yes, she's MY personal computer geek.
"Is that your way of saying you missed me?" because I've missed you, he added internally. He rubbed his fingers together as he listened for her answer, hoping to relax his nerves.
"No."
Uh...Oliver stopped rubbing his fingers for a millisecond. That response was unexpected.
"But, if it works for you, go with it," she added quickly.
"Heh," he chuckled nervously. No Oliver! Pull yourself together! "So, a friend of mine is running a scavenger hunt and there's a case of Lafite Rothschild 1982 waiting at the end."
He smiled inwardly. Her lustful reaction was exactly the reaction he was looking for. He knew that Felicity liked red wine and he knew she would know about Lafite Rothschild. He had discovered that she had taken a wine course in college.
"I love red wine," she breathed seductively.
I am definitely winning this round.
"But in order to find it, I first need to get through this," he held out the security fob and kept his laid back demeanor.
Please be too distracted by the wine to catch my lie.
"Hmm," she took the device, "security fob."
Oliver walked around her desk as she opened the small device. He leaned in and suddenly remembered the first time he was so close to her. She had been wearing pink.
Focus, Oliver.
She plugged the device in and a security page appeared, "It's PIN protected. Challenge response goes back to a company called Blackhawk Squad Protection Group."
"Yeah, my friend had his bodyguard set it up for him, personally, I, uh, think it's cheating, but whatever," he answered, hoping she didn't notice the slight falter in his voice.
"This is a military-grade cryptographic security protocol. Your 'friend' really went to all this trouble?" she looked him in the eye.
Dammit. Every time.
"The idle rich are hard to entertain," he lied and watched to gauge her reaction. She raised her eyebrows and pursed her lips together, as if to say "Yeah, right."
Shit. Reign this in, Oliver.
"Listen, you get through it and one of those bottles of wine is yours," he reminded her of the wine, hoping to distract her from her accusatory thoughts. He finished by tapping his finger on her shoulder and walking away before he became flustered by her, like usual.
He didn't look back, but he heard her fingers start tapping on the the keys again. Thank God.
The mission wasn't over yet, and he would have to talk to Felicity again before all was said and done. He hadn't won the Battle of Smoak yet, but he felt like he had a pretty good lead, so he allowed himself a smug smirk as he faded from her view.
The game was on.
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The next day, Oliver bounded down the stairs to his basement lair in the foundry when his phone rang and Felicity's number flashed on the screen.
He answered the phone with as much rich-boy nonchalant swagger as he could, "What did'ja get?"
"I think your friend's bodyguard gave him the wrong security fob," she said flatly. He was right about this guy, wasn't he?
"Why is that?" he asked, not liking where this was going.
"Well," she began, "once I got past Blackhawk's authentication system, there wasn't anything about a scavenger hunt."
Her voice was dripping with accusations.
Damn.
"Just a directory. Well, I think you've stumbled onto, or got me to stumble onto, something pretty illegal," she continued.
"Define illegal."
"Oh you know, robbing an armored car with grenade launchers and tear gas."
"Wa, what?" his voice lowered and quieted. This wasn't a game anymore.
"Someone at Blackhawk was using their system to store detailed routes and schedules for each of the cities seven major armored car carriers," she explained.
Rage raced through him. He was right. And Diggle. How was he going to tell Dig? And now Felicity was involved.
Shit.
She kept describing the contents of the security fob as Oliver struggled to contain his anger, "including the three that have already been hit. Mr. Queen, I think we should provide this information to the police.
No! "Wa.." he tried to stop her, but she continued.
"With it, they should be able to predict the next heist."
"Hold on. Felicity? I don't want to get you in trouble with my friend, so do me a favor, forward that directory on to me and I'll get it to the police personally. Thank you," he said quickly and abruptly hung up.
DAMMIT.
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Two days later, Felicity came across one of the many Starling City blogs that followed the vigilante's activities (as best they could).
A headline caught her eye,
"THE HOOD INVOLVED IN STOPPING ARMORED CAR HEISTS IN THE GLADES."
Felicity tilted her head and narrowed her eyes.
"Scavenger hunt, my ass."
