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- Anchored To The Tide, Pt 10 -
"You're good at that."
Oliver turned to the doorway, where Felicity stood, watching over them. He closed the book and put it on the bedside table, bending down to lay a kiss on his daughter's forehead.
"I didn't even hear you, that's progress," he whispered teasingly, winking to the blonde before crossing down to the door, closing it softly as they walked to the living room.
"You want some wine?"
"Yeah, red?"
"Sure," he smiled, grabbing two glasses and a bottle of Côte du Rhône he had been meaning to share with his wine connoisseur of a partner.
Oliver opened the red millésime, pouring a liberal amount of wine into their glasses. Thank God for his father's habit of tax evasion and their love for good cépages, he thought as he watched his partner swirl the liquid, smelling it with her eyes closed before she took her first sip. Shit, the experience she was having seemed almost erotic, he mused as she sighed, her eyes popping wide open to look at him.
"Oliver!" She cried out, slapping her hand to her mouth as she realized the volume of her voice could have easily woken up the sleeping little girl three doors down. Oliver winced, waiting for his child to scream, cry, or both, but it seemed they were safe for now.
"Sorry," Felicity blushed, "obviously my mom could never teach me the importance of inside voice...Do your kid a favor and insist on that particular lesson...Or don't...I mean, you can raise her however you see fit. I'm not her mother, so...I-"
"Fe-li-ci-ty," he teased, laying his hand under her chin to look her into the eyes, "it's OK. Now, don't you like the wine?"
"Of course I like the wine, Oliver, do you even know what we're drinking?" She grabbed the bottle, adjusting her glasses on her nose to read the label. "Yes, just as I thought...It's a Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Oliver, that's freaking expensive," she exclaimed. "Not that I don't appreciate it. It's good, with a beautiful garnet color, and don't even get me started on the flavors...but still, I was thinking something more along the line of a 20$ bottle-"
"Just enjoy it, Felicity," he smiled softly to his babbling blonde, "you should know by now that great perks come with money and the Queen name." Oliver winked to her, laying his hand atop her own.
"Came-"
"What?" He asked, confused, before she cut him off again.
"Came. The perks. In the past...Never mind, forget I said anything, I don't know why my brain thought it would be a good idea to remind you that you won't have all those anymore." She bit her thumb, worriedly looking to the side, only flicking her glance back to him when he spoke.
"Hey, that's alright, you can't help it. Besides, you're right, I won't. Not until I get my money or my company back, preferably both." His eyes clouded with anxiety and she blamed herself for choosing that subject instead of a million others when he decided to share a good bottle of red wine with her.
"Though, just so you know," he added teasingly, "you don't have to worry about any short supply of good wine."
"What- How?" She asked him, surprised at his matter-of-fact tone, not so much at his smoothness. He was Oliver Queen after all, and if there was one thing he had down to a pat, it was charm.
"My dad loved his wine," he smiled, "he had a wine cellar in our house back in the day, but my mom had it transferred in a high secured storage facility when we disappeared on the Gambit. None of it was on the books, so they never seized it. My mom used to joke it was my father's insurance policy tax free when I was younger," he explained, progressively getting lost in a time long past.
"At least he had good taste," Felicity deadpanned.
Oliver laughed, it never failed to amaze him, but she could always make him feel better. It was the lack of filter that made her so refreshingly different, one of those things she did that he loved. He sighed, knowing they both needed to get back to business. The psychopath turning the people of Starling City into human detonators wasn't going to stop on his own, and they needed to talk about what she learned at Kord Industries. Not that Oliver wouldn't have preferred to keep their easy banter going, but the city came first. It had to, the stakes were too high not to be their priority.
"So? Anything new to report today?"
"I don't think it's Kord, Oliver."
"Why do you say that? He's the most likely suspect. He has the means-"
"But what about the motive? What would he gain from it?" Felicity asked after taking another sip of the delicious wine. She might have moaned a bit- and if the way Oliver's eyes were now bulging were to be trusted, she definitely did.
"Felicity," he warned, his eyes looking dangerously predatory as he licked his lips.
"Right, right, focus...So, Ted Kord, means, yes, but no motive-"
"That you know of," he said, cutting her off.
"True, but the man is rich, blowing people off would only bring him bad press...I don't know, I'm not seeing it. Besides, he's barely there, I've seen him step once in the tech department so far, twice maybe...What if it's not him? What are we going to do?"
"Then we search and we do it again, until we find that crazy son of a bitch," Oliver spat, clenching his fist with determination. "Do you think it could be someone else from the company?"
"Maybe? I don't know everyone yet, and all the searches I've done on their internal database have come up empty-"
"Did you cross reference them with the police?"
"Really, Oliver? Do I teach you how to knock your arrows?" She questioned, raising an eyebrow at his inquiry. "Look, we'll get him," Felicity reassured, squeezing his fist with her hand until he relaxed infinitesimally under her touch. "We just need more time."
"You're right. We need a way to track him."
"I've already asked Cisco and Caitlin if they had any ideas, they will keep us posted," she interrupted her moody vigilante.
"Good, that's good," he sighed heavily.
"How was Em tonight?"Felicity tried to change the subject, as nothing could be done by dragging through what they didn't know tonight.
"OK, more or less. She asked about you, wouldn't go down to sleep until you were there," he cracked a smile at his daughter's stubborn demeanor and her fierce, almost instantaneous love for his partner.
"Until super daddy saved the day with The Little Prince?" Felicity teased him, smiling at Oliver and his easy grin, unburdened from the usual weight that rested on his shoulder when he talked about his daughter, even though he might not be aware of it, yet.
He did lighten up when they spoke about the little girl these days. Perhaps he only needed to find a light to overbalance the darkness in his life, she mused, watching him smirk at her. Yet, whilst Felicity sipped her wine, a fleeting thought kept invading her brain, telling her to enjoy these simple pleasures while she could- the easy companionship they shared, toeing a dangerous line between friends, partners and lovers, parents and heroes, trying to make it work into their already complicated dynamic.
Somehow, at that precise moment, she wouldn't have been able to muster up the grudge she held over him for months, she only saw their messed up lives seamlessly blending together when it should have been harder. The pessimistic side of her tried to warn Felicity that perhaps the worst was yet to come, but she wouldn't listen to that sinister little music, preferring to focus instead on Oliver's smiling face, hanging on for the ride of her life along his side.