A/N: Tag to episode 1x11 Trust But Verify. I couldn't remember when the first time Diggle meets Felicity on the show is, but I seem to be thinking it's when he shows up with Oliver in Vertigo with the "energy drink hangover" whatever story - so, just go with it and pretend that's the case if they have met before that in canon.
"You sure you want to keep involving an IT girl from your family's company in all this?" Diggle asks from across the room. "Wasn't very hard to figure out why you keep going to the IT department after Knox said somebody hacked their system."
Oliver glances up, sees the trace of disapproval he'd heard in the other man's words all over his face and debates ignoring him entirely.
"She's already involved," he says after a moment's thought, hoping that will be the end of the conversation.
"My point being, is that a wise decision?" Diggle persists, crossing his arms over his chest as he levels Oliver with a look that says plainly enough what he thinks of Felicity Smoak's involvement in the vigilante's world.
"I can't exactly go back and change it," Oliver reminds him, having a hard time keeping the edge out of his words.
"But you can change whether or not you go to her in the future for help," Diggle counters, keeping his own voice calm, steady, merely conversational.
"I don't have," Oliver pauses, considering the right way to say it, "I don't have her skill level."
It's the closest he's going to come to admitting he needs her. That the vigilante needs Felicity in order to keep crossing names off the list. The same way he'd needed Diggle. A means of having support, another set of tools that can help him. Even so, Oliver has to admit Diggle has a point. Bringing her into this, even as little as he has - which admittedly is quite a lot considering some of the information she's unearthed - puts her in a dangerous situation. Puts him, and Diggle by association, in a dangerous situation. Because every ridiculous lie he has to tell to gain her help is one lie closer to her finding out the truth.
To possibly revealing him as the vigilante, even if something inside him says she'd never tell.
"And she hacks security companies for you because you ask her nicely? No questions?" Diggle asks, skeptical.
"There may have been a hypothetical bottle of wine involved this time that may have persuaded her to help," Oliver admits and regrets it when the look of exasperation crosses Diggle's face.
"Don't tell me you're flirting with this girl so you can use her, Oliver."
"I'm not flirting with her," he insists, ignoring the way his mind replays the 'Is that your way of saying you missed me?' which admittedly was just the tiniest bit of instinctive flirting. "It was a prize for a scavenger hunt I told her I needed help with and I might have said if she helped me win, I'd give her the wine."
"Oliver, man, you have got to work on your cover stories," Diggle shakes his head, but smiles all the same. "Especially if you want this girl on your team."
"I know," Oliver agrees, wondering - not for the first time - how it's possible he has become such a good liar in some aspects of his life yet can't concoct a believable one any time he needs Felicity's help.
"At least tell me you got her that bottle of wine?"
Oliver winces at the question.
"It's possible I forgot to do that," he says and Diggle lifts his hands in the air, an 'I give up' gesture if Oliver has ever seen one.
"Don't tell me that," Diggle warns, yet another disapproving expression settling onto his face that makes it clear he thinks Oliver has indeed simply been using Felicity Smoak and flirting with her to get results.
"I'll send it tomorrow, I promise," he says, because suddenly, he's on Diggle's side concerning his possibly having used her and feels a bottle of wine is the least he can do to say thank you.
Six weeks is a relatively short time in the grand scheme of life, but for Felicity, it seemed significantly long. Mostly, and she hates to admit this, because she'd grown somewhat used to Oliver Queen popping into the IT department with his ridiculous stories and needing her help. It had made her feel… special. Important. How many girls could say they got personal visits from Starling City's most eligible - if slightly damaged - bachelor? And just maybe she'd thought, after the unexpected visit to thank her for the card she'd sent him, that there might be some hint of attraction there on his part, too.
But then one week had passed, two, and three stretched into six with no hint of Mr. Queen returning to the IT department. Which, when accompanied by the sudden disappearance of Walter Steele and her inability to locate even the slightest trace of him, had thrown Felicity into a decidedly depressing funk she didn't particularly care to acknowledge. Needless to say, having the enigmatic Queen grace her with his presence had made her day a little brighter. Momentarily. She'd been naive enough at first to think the flimsy excuse about a scavenger hunt was merely a reason he'd thought up to see her.
Reality came crashing down on her fairly quickly. Men like Oliver Queen are interested in women like her for one reason, and one reason only. Her talent. What she can do for him, and as surely as Felicity had latched onto the offered bottle of wine, she'd also accepted rather quickly that it was merely his way of bribing her into doing what he wanted her to and let go of any hope of ever seeing that bottle following their final conversation. Two days later and it's still bothering her, ever so slightly, even if she's come to terms with it - for the most part.
"Hey, you've got someone waiting for you at your desk," breaks into Felicity's thoughts as she stares absently at the coffee machine in front of her.
"Hmm?"
"Someone's waiting for you upstairs," Jenn, a fellow IT girl, repeats, maneuvering around Felicity so she can grab a cup of coffee.
"Thanks," she murmurs, her mind still caught up in thoughts of Oliver Queen as she heads back to the IT department.
Halfway there it fully registers what Jenn said and there's the inevitable skip to her heart that suggests she's hoping said visitor is Mr. Queen in the flesh. Regardless of whether he's simply using her for her very exceptional skills, there's no way Felicity can deny she enjoys seeing him. It's not like she gets very many personal visitors from anyone else. Mostly phone calls asking her to do this or that, whatever it is the incompetent employees of Queen Consolidated are incapable of doing themselves. Aside from Chris in accounting, who she does not enjoy seeing, Felicity really only gets one other personal visitor.
And the person waiting for her is most definitely not that person.
"Oh, hi," slips out of her, sounding disappointed even to her own ears.
"Not who you were expecting?" the man asks, and there's something in the way he says it, in the amused smile he wears, that makes Felicity feel like he can read her thoughts.
"I wasn't expecting anyone. No one at all," she insists, possibly a little more forcefully than necessary. "How can I help you, Mr. …?"
"Diggle, but I'm not here for IT assistance, Ms. Smoak," he says, holding up a bag that she recognizes as being one that would hold wine. "As promised, Mr. Queen sends his thanks."
"Are you the friend who set up the scavenger hunt for him?" Felicity asks as a way of masking her sudden excitement. Because if there's one thing she loves, it's red wine, and here she'd given up on ever seeing that bottle.
"I can't say I was involved in any scavenger hunt," Diggle's expression changes to one of annoyance for a fraction of a second before easily settling into one of indifference.
"Yeah, well, I'm not so sure he can either," Felicity says, and it's clear by the sudden tensing of his jaw that Mr. Diggle doesn't want to talk about anything involving a scavenger hunt that lead her to the discovery of armored car heists. She's not sure she blames him.
"Not much of a wine man myself," Diggle says, changing the subject swiftly, smoothly as he sets the bag down on Felicity's desk. "But I have it on good authority this is one of the best."
Later, when Felicity goes home, settles into her bath with music on low and a glass of that wine in hand, she's more than inclined to agree with his statement.