Chapter 2:

Twitchy

Emily followed the man called Mr. Diggle out of the livingroom, and up the stairs. She couldn't help but marvel at the beauty of the house, even though her thoughts were somewhere else.

"Can I ask you something?" She caught up with Diggle, and he glanced down at her slightly surprised.

"Of course."

"Where's Thea Queen?" Emily had done her research in the car once the damn lawyer had shut up. She saw Diggle tensing up for a second, but he quickly recovered. But she knew she'd hit a spot.

"In light of everything that's happened to the Queen family, she didn't feel like sticking around." He said, and stopped in front of a door. "The guest room."

"Fancy." Emily remarked as she swung the door open, glancing back at Diggle. "Like everything else around here."

"You should probably get used to it." He smiled, Emily found herself liking his smile, it was honest.

"Oh joy", she said and thoughtlessly reached out to put her bag on the chair right by the door, unfortunately she missed and it fell over, content spilling out across the floor.

"Damnit", she hissed, immediately reaching down for her laptop and camera to check if they were okay. Diggle had bent down too, and glancing up she found him freezing over one object in particular.

The notebook with the list.

"I've got this, thanks for showing me the way." She shot up, laptop forgotten and zigzagged over the mess to the door. He stood up too, as she practically pushed him out the door.

"Sleep well." He said, and she nodded before closing the door around him.

Shit.

…

Meanwhile in the living room;

"We have a problem." Diggle announced as he came down into the living room. Felicity and Oliver both looked slightly startled.

"What do you mean?" Oliver asked.

"She has a copy of the list, the same notebook that you had two years ago." Diggle crossed his arms, looking quite intimidating.

"What does that mean?" Felicity asked worriedly, she'd rather not have to disarm a bomb again.

"It means that she knows more than she's letting on, we need to keep an eye on her."

"She doesn't seem to be the type who likes that." Diggle said, "You two have that in common."

"She's about to become a public figure and a big voice in the company, it's only logical that she'd need bodyguard." Oliver shrugged, glancing at Diggle.

"Hey I'm not doing it, I've go you to baby-sit."

"I wasn't thinking about you," Oliver smiled. "I know someone who needs to learn some patience."

"Oooh he's not going to like that." Felicity said doubtfully as she caught on.

"That's the point."

…

Apartments in the city were never pitch black, the lights from the street outside flickered through the curtains of her bedroom. It usually never bothered her, but she'd slept restlessly the last few days, and the sound of a soft thud from somwehere in the apartment easily woken her up.

She sat up, throwing the covers off her bare knees. The air was chilly and she shuddered through her thin pajama top and shorts as she quietly tiptoed across her room to the door. Her mother hadn't been sleeping since that thing about the boat going missing on the news a few days earlier, when Emily asked she'd just walked away.

She went out into the hallway, she thought her mother was just awake, sitting with a cup of tea- or something stronger, in the kitchen. But then there was a another thud, a heavy one, followed by a strangled sound. Emily's heart sped up and she ran down the corridor, stopping dead when she reached the kitchen.

A broken whiskybottle lay by her feet, and the brownish content spreading across the floor, mixing with the growing pool of red blood.

The growing pool of red blood surrounding her mother.

A noise somewhere between fear and surprise escaped her lips as she bolted across the floor, the broken glass cut her feet as she kneeled down next to her mother. She knew she was screaming, but she didn't know what. Somewhere in her panic she realized her hands were completely covered in blood, and she looked up.

A man stood in the doorway, right where she'd stood just a few moments earlier. A black hood covered his face and a bow resting in his arm. Emily froze, her vision blurred by the tears running down her cheeks.

"Please-" she stammered "please..."

"It was her own fault." The man said in a dark voice, and then he was gone.

Emily woke with a gasp.

Breathing heavily she was momentarily distracted by the unfamiliar room around her, before she remembered she was at the Queen's mansion. She threw her legs across the bed, and sat like that until the shivering stopped and the nightmare slowly passed away.

She didn't dream about that night seven years ago when her mother was killed every night, but she did often. The nightmares had picked up this last year when she started investigating about the black clad man standing by her kitchen door. The man that killed her mother.

She'd been fourteen when she told the police, they hadn't believed her, all the evidence pointed against a robbery gone wrong. She'd just been traumatized, she hadn't actually seen someone with a bow and a hood they told her.

Emily had almost believed them until a year ago, when she made the connection between the list and the undertaking of the Glades in Starling. Unfortunately knowing that Malcolm Merlyn was dead she'd lost her biggest chance of finding the archer who killed her mother. There was still too many loose ends and no way of connecting them.

Until now.

She made her way to the bathroom connected with the bedroom, and stepped into the shower. She needed to have her gameface on today if she wanted things to go smoothly, she couldn't get distracted.

If she'd have to play the part long lost daughter of Robert Queen to the press and new boardmember to the company to find the truth about her mothers murder, she would.

Only thing that had caught her off guard was Oliver Queen, she'd expected a careless billionaire playboy, what she'd gotten was something completely different. The way he'd calculated her the entire time, he was more that he was letting off. Not to talk about his way overqualified EA and nosy but nice bodyguard.

After washing off and putting on her underwear she wrapped a towel around her hair and stepped back into the bedroom. To her surprise a jacket and skirt had been spread neatly at the end of her bed, and a pair of high heeled shoes next to it. She turned her head to the side, the gray suit was so completely out of her style that she had to laugh, but if she had to play the game, she guessed she had to go all in.

She slipped into the suit but kept a simple v-neck t-shirt under the jacket. Letting out her hair she kept it in waves around her face and put some makeup on. At last she stepped into the killer black heels, and glanced in the mirror. To her surprise she almost looked like a true Queen like this, she narrowed her eyes, not knowing if she liked it.

She put the notebook under the mattress and pushed her bag in under the bed. After taking a deep breath she stepped out the door.

Emily had made it all the way to the staircase before she realized that someone had been following her. Turning on her heel she found herself face to face with a not unattractive young man in a formal suit.

"I don't think we've been introduced?" She said pointedly, and he raised one eyebrow.

"Roy Harper, I'm your new bodyguard."

"Really?" Emily looked him up and down, he seemed to be about her age, maybe a few years older, and with her shoes on they were the same height. But what struck her most was his attitude and the way he kept changing his stance.

"Is there a problem?" He asked when she neither moved or said anything.

"You're too twitchy to be a bodyguard", she pointed out, and thought she heard him growl slightly. He definitely wasn't bodyguard material.

"I'm new."

"Is it your first day?" Emily said sarcastically, seeing if she'd pushed another button. Judging by his dark gaze she had, but then this guy did seem to have a lot of buttons.

"Don't you have somewhere to be, Miss Bauer?"

"Right." Emily grinned slightly to herself as she made her way down the stairs, and he followed her. Oliver and Diggle were waiting in the hallway.

"We should leave, now." Oliver ordered in a way that let her know he was used to people obeying immidately.

"I'd really love some coffee, or you know... food." She said, but he'd already placed a hand on her upper back, guiding her out the door.

"No time, you can eat afterwards."

"Great" she muttered as the four of them headed out the door, glancing back she saw her new bodyguard exchanging a glance with Diggle. "And by the way, why do I need a bodyguard?" She added.

"Because you're going to be in the spotlight the moment you take your place on the board, and I need you to be safe." Oliver said as he opened the car door for her. She narrowed her eyes as Diggle took the wheel and Roy took the seat in front of her.

"Then why you put Twitchy on me, he can't be a very good bodyguard."

"Twitchy?" Diggle turned around with a grin, and Roy gave him a glare.

"He's very capable Emily, I promise you." Oliver glanced at her, and that apparently was the end of that.

"If you say so" Emily said as the car started and they drove away. She did make them stop for a coffee and a sandwich on the way, much to everybody's annoyance. And she was still swiping breadcrumbs off her suit as they parked outside Queen Consolidated's headquarters.

When they stepped off the elevator at the right floor Felicity, the blonde EA were waiting for them. "You're late" she said, and then saw Emily "and you look very official, miss Bauer."

"Well thank you, I didn't choose it." She glanced at Oliver, who shrugged.

"I need for you to make a good impression."

"And I can't to that in flats?" She said disbelievingly, her feet already starting to ache. She almost thought she saw the ghost of a smile on his face.

"All you have to do in there is follow my lead okay?"

"Right."

"Good luck" Felicity called after them as she followed Oliver inside the conference room, were the table was already occupied by the board. Emily glanced back at the blonde, Diggle and Roy. She had a weird feeling about that gang, they knew each other to well for their positions, not to talk about their relationship with their boss.

But right now she had more pressing matters to deal with. And that happened to be a room full off corporate sharks that probably wanted her out of the picture.

The next few hours where a mixture of ass kissing, accusations and finally an agreement. Oliver was the new CEO, and she, officially a member of the board.

And to think 24 hours earlier she'd been camped out in her car wondering if it was worth blowing her cover to go pee behind a bush.

Felicity, Diggle and Roy all waited for them as they came out, Oliver with a smile. "Company's still in the family." He said, and Emily watched as Felicity lit up. Yepp, there was definitely something going on between the two of them.

"So what now?" She wondered out loud, she couldn't exactly go back home, she didn't know any of these people and she had a new job she knew absolutely nothing about.

"Maybe the two of you should spend some time together, get to know each other." Diggle suggested, a meaningful look towards Oliver. "I'm sure she has a lot of questions about your father... her father."

"I-" Emily started, but realized this was a good chance to dig a little deeper. "I do have a few questions."

"Then it's settled, you should go get some food. I need the afternoon off anyway." Diggle grinned.

"Lyla?" Felicity glanced at him, and he nodded with a grin.

"Fine, let's go" Oliver said, and obviously expected her to follow. Emily glanced back at Roy.

"No Twitchy?"

"He has other things to do." Oliver glanced back at him with an arched eyebrow, and Roy rolled his eyes. "Don't worry, you'll be safe." He added as they reached the elevator.

"I'm not worried." She said dryly. She'd been on her own for seven years, she was used to taking care of herself.

…

Oliver watched as Emily dug into her fries. They were sitting at the Big Belly Burger, the only place he could come up with, and had been silent for several minutes. He wasn't used to people being silent around him, and especially not like this, the silence didn't seem to bother her.

She did, however, bother him though. Not only for the obvious reasons that she was his half sister, that his father had known about for so many years without telling anyone about. She was just very... secretive.

"So who'd you choose psychology?" He asked finally, and she glanced up, a small grin spreading across her face.

"Someone did their homework."

"You're a reporter, you didn't exactly come unprepared did you?" He pointed out, and she rolled her eyes and took another bite.

"Investigative reporter, I don't care about gossip like who slept with who. So you don't have to worry about me selling any of your precious secrets to the press."

"I wasn't." She'd sidetracked him "But why psychology, and why going into journalism after that?"

"Do you want the honest answer or the easy answer?" She surprised him by saying, without looking up. Oliver took a sip from his cup.

"Honest."

"Well," she straightened up "I had a whole bunch of psychologists telling me I was prone to like a dozen mental problems considering my absent father, finding my mother murdered and spending almost four years in the system. I just figured I'd be able to diagnose myself before I went crazy."

Oliver hadn't exactly expected that answer.

"I'm sorry... About your mother." He hadn't known Emily had been the one to find her dead.

"Also, I'm extremely good at reading people." Emily added in a lighter tone, ignoring his words. He raised an eyebrow as she grinned slightly. "What's with you and blondie?"

"Is that really what you wanted to ask me?" He said with a small laugh.

"No", she grinned. "But that was easier to ask."

They ate for a while longer in silence, Oliver was still pondering his different impressions of her. On one hand she seemed like a smart girl who'd just gone through a lot, but on the other hand she had a copy of the list, and her mother had been on it.

"What happened, to your mother?" He asked carefully.

"Breaking and entering, my mother woke up, probably tried to stop him."

"They never caught the man?"

"No." Emily's eyes were dark, all traces of humor gone as she looked up at him. "This was three days after the Queen's Gambit went down."

Oliver opened his mouth, then closed it again, he could feel her evaluating him.

"Again, I'm sorry to hear."

"You've lost a lot of people too." She said "It's hard."

"Yes, yes it is." Their conversation had taken a surprising turn that he hadn't expected. He hadn't expected to find a kind of understanding between them. He cleared his throat, and the moment was gone.

"So was there anything you wanted to know about my... our father?"

"I don't know... Do I want to know about him? The man obviously knew I existed and paid off my mother to move away and have me somewhere else." Emily's voice grew cold, and Oliver suddenly realized how all this must seem like from her side. She'd never had a father, and she'd lost her mother as a teenager, he'd been so concentrated on saving his company that he never thought of how this actually affected her.

"He was an asshole, but, he was a good father." Oliver finally said, and Emily glanced up at him, a small smile on her lips.

"Okay"

"Okay." Oliver grinned back.

AN: Firstly, thanks for the amazing response on the first chapter, especially to those of you who took the time to review!

Secondly (Spoiler alert, if you for some reason haven't seen the first episode of season 3 yet, stop reading now!)

I started writing this before the episode and I just wanted to make it clear I'm not going to follow the plot of the show. Biggest differences are probably that this takes place right after season 2, not five months after. Also Oliver didn't lose the company and the mansion. Easiest for me is to think of this as an alternative storyline, and that's also why I kind of went back to the plot of season 1 to base my story on. But other then that I might use some things here and there from season 3, like characters and such.