(A/N: I had no idea this would end up as long as it did. It just came out so easily. Anyway, this was the result of a conversation between me and thatmasquedgirl, which culminating in me saying I could put shirtless Oliver, suspenders Oliver, and crying Oliver all in the same one-shot. :P That it actually fit into one of my dialogue prompts was a bonus.)

Promise Me You'll Never Do That Again

Felicity pulled at the zip ties pinning her wrists together, but they were too tight, and any movement seemed to make them tighter. They were cutting into her skin. She slumped against the interior of the van.

The evening had started out okay. She'd actually eaten a well-balanced meal instead of burgers and fries from Big Belly. And she eaten at the table across from the training mats while Dig and Oliver worked out, so she had mealtime entertainment and eye candy. Not that the change in cuisine stopped Oliver from stealing a bite or two off her plate. And of course he went for the good stuff, ignoring the pale slice of tomato she'd picked off her sandwich. She'd slapped his hand, but he just popped the bite of chicken salad in his mouth and smiled.

"Go put a shirt on," she'd grumbled.

His smile widened into a grin and he backed away from her, holding up his hands. He turned and headed up the stairs, probably to get ready for that charity gala that had been on his calendar for months. Every time Felicity brought it up, he griped about it and then changed the subject. So she'd had to make all the arrangements herself, even roping Thea into procuring Oliver's tux and bringing it to the office so Felicity could have it dry-cleaned. She was afraid she'd have to force him into the garments, with the way he'd been acting, but tonight he seemed capable of dressing himself. He might have even been in a good mood, but it was hard to tell with Oliver sometimes.

Felicity started a search on one of her monitors while Dig gulped down a ton of water and devoured the turkey avocado sandwich she'd gotten him.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked after a while.

"Oliver. Where does he shower?" She ignored Diggle's raised eyebrows. Not everything that came out of her mouth was an innuendo.

"I mean, I know I don't spend as much time down here now that Oliver and Sara are basically living here. Together. But I know it better than anyone. I redesigned it myself, and I know—" She waved her hand, and the pen she'd been holding flew over her shoulder. "I know there's no shower here." She got up and walked around her workstation, looking for her pen. "There' sno shower in this whole building. So where does he go?"

"Felicity, I spend exactly zero percent of my time thinking about Oliver in the shower," Dig said.

"That is the correct answer," said a voice almost deep enough to dip into the Arrow register.

Felicity peeked over the back of the monitor. Oliver was coming down the steps two at a time. His hair was still damp and sticking up everywhere, and he held his jacket thrown over his shoulder by one hooked finger. And he was wearing suspenders. Her night really was improving.

He'd caught her staring then, and she ducked behind the monitor, forgetting for a moment why she was back there. She took a step to the side, but her heel caught a looped cord, and she went down.

It didn't seem possible for Oliver to cross the distance between them as fast as he did, but somehow he was there and drawing her to her feet. Without thinking, she used his suspenders to pull herself up, and she was still holding onto them when he cleared his throat. She quickly stepped backward. Her heel caught again, and Oliver grasped her elbows and pulled her toward him. She stepped right out of her shoes.

"What are you doing back here, anyway?" he asked.

"M-my pen," she stuttered.

Oliver crouched and plucked the pen from a nest of cords. It was a tangled mess she'd have to do something about eventually, but—

"Your suspenders are totally distracting," Felicity mumbled.

"What?" He stood up and held out the pen.

"Nothing." She took it and tucked it behind her ear. "Thanks."

"Maybe you should leave the heavy lifting to those of us who don't wear heels."

Felicity reached up for her pen and flung it at him. It bounced off his chest and skittered across the floor. But the pen had been uncapped, and now Oliver's snowy tux shirt was marred by a streak of blue ink. He looked down at it.

"Wow," she said. "Oops. Maybe you should leave your jacket buttoned all night."

His lips quirked up. "Maybe you should use your words instead of throwing stuff at me."

Felicity didn't want to give him the satisfaction of using her words, and now there was nothing left to throw in arm's reach. So she settled for returning to her chair.

"I can Google ink stains," she said.

"No time," said Oliver. "I have another shirt somewhere." He pulled the suspenders off his shoulders and started unbuttoning his shirt. Had Hanukkah come early? In all his shirtless glory, he strode across her field of vision, suspenders hanging from his hips. It kind of reminded her of the July picture on the sexy-fireman-of-the-month calendar that had most certainly not been on her fridge until very recently, when Dig had started making frequent visits to check up on her while Slade was on the loose.

Only now, as she lay tied up inside a creep's van, did she remember the little smirk on Oliver's face as he took the long way around the room to get to the duffel where he kept his clothes. Jerk.

Felicity yanked at the zip ties again. The van hit a bump, and she tumbled onto her side, hissing as the plastic ties cut her skin. She could feel the blood running down her arm.

"I should have known it was too good to be true," she said to herself. "Shirtless Oliver, suspenders Oliver, flagrantly shirtless Oliver, delicious suspenders Oliver for one brief minute, and then . . . BAM. Knocked out by some faceless creep on the way to my car."

She couldn't remember much from the time Oliver left for the gala until she'd awoken tied up in this fan. Felicity was sure it was because she'd been drugged, a theory backed up by her dry mouth and throbbing head. The driver took a hard right, and she rolled across the floor, slamming headfirst into the other side.

"Ow. Hurry up, boys."

Felicity had no doubt her boys would come for her. She just didn't know how long it would take them to realize she was gone, and by then it might be too late.

The van lurched. It felt like the driver was swerving violently from side to side.

"I'm getting tossed around like a rag doll in here," she said. "Which is dumb, now that I think about it, because what kid even owns a rag doll anymore? Not when there are Barbies and Bratz and Disney princesses and Amercian Girl. But not me. I just had Cleo the stuffed donkey, and I'd whisper to him, 'You are an ass—'"

The van hit something then, hard. Felicity was thrown forward and then back, hitting her head hard enough to lose consciousness. The shock of cold air hitting her face brought her around. She saw her captor's face now as he dragged her out of the van by her bound wrists and ankles. Blood dripped down his cheek from a fresh cut. Felicity gasped when she realized he wouldn't have let her see him if he didn't plan to kill her.

Before she'd even begun to process that thought, the man lifted her effortlessly and threw her. Threw her. Cold night air rushed into her open mouth. She gasped and choked, twisting futilely against her bonds, blinded by the darkness and the loss of her glasses somewhere along the way.

Water. She heard the sound of it just before she hit the surface. It felt as if a giant wet hand had slapped her with all its might. Then she panicked. Arching and bucking in the water, she tugged at her bonds, ignoring the pain as the zip ties and her own nails tore at her skin. Bobbing on the surface for a moment, she opened her mouth to scream, but a current pulled her under and she got a mouthful of water instead.

It was cold. The kind of cold that even she couldn't find enough words to describe. Her hands were already numb, fingers scrabbling clumsily now at the ties around her ankles. The darkness was absolute, not even the smallest shimmer of light to tell her which direction to kick toward the surface.

So, so cold. But Felicity was pissed now. She wasn't going down without a fight. She kicked and writhed and bucked like a mermaid having a seizure. But her lungs burned, and contrary to everything she knew, she couldn't stop her mouth from opening to draw in a breath.

Cold, brackish water poured down her throat and windpipe. She gasped and coughed, but she was underwater, so it only invited more water in.

To her, there was no transition from drowning to rescue. She didn't feel strong arms surrounding her, or the rush of wind as her head broke the surface. It was just blackness to blackness, and she didn't know she was out of the water until she was coughing up half the lake onto Oliver's lap.

Oliver?

She tried to say his name, but it only made her cough harder. Once she caught her breath, she looked up at him. All his walls were down, the many masks cast aside, his dark blue eyes filled with tears. Her hand reached up to cup his jaw, and she glared at it as if it had moved of its own accord. His eyes closed and the tears spilled over. Oliver drew her close and rested his chin on her forehead.

"Promise," he said, his voice rough as if he'd been shouting. "Promise you'll never do that again."

"What? Get snatched by some psycho and hurled into the water?"

"No."

She pulled back so she could see his face. The traitor hand that had slipped around the back of his neck came down, and her fingers gently brushed away the tears on his cheek.

"Never throw your pen at me gain," he said solemnly.

Felicity choked out a laugh, and his arms tightened around her. She was soaked and freezing, but she barely felt it as her arms slid around his torso to return the hug.

"Ooo, the suspenders are still here," she mumbled as her fingers brushed past them. "My night keeps getting better and better."