The next morning I got started on finishing the paint. I'd gotten up around six, figured I'd get a few hours in before we headed out to the site. I really wanted to get it done since I was so close to finished. Around eight or so I turned off the spray gun, pulled off my mask and took a step back to get a good view of what I'd done. "Damn I'm good." I say that a lot when I work on cars, because it's the truth. I set the mask on the counter, washed my hands and went inside. Coyote was sitting at her desk working on an engineering gig. She'd must have hit hyperfocus mode because she didn't look up when I walked in and tried to get her attention. "Hey, she's pretty much done." She didn't even move. Usually when she's like this I leave her alone but I was pretty amped up about how good the car looked so I put my hand on her shoulder and she about jumped out of the chair.

"What the! Oh..hey."

"You okay there darlin'. Didn't expect you to jump that high."

"Yeah, just caught me off guard. What's up?"

"She's pretty much done. I'm starving."

"Really? Sweet!" She headed out to the garage while I dug in the fridge for some food. I was taking the first bite of a sandwich when she popped back in.

"Damn, you're good."

"I said the same thing a few minutes ago."

She chuckled and shot me an odd look. "She looks even better than last night. Why don't you stay and finish her? I can handle telling Gerald where to put stuff and we have enough people this time to get done what we need to today."

"It would be nice to check this off the list. Thanks."

"No problem, just seems silly when you're so close to take off and do something else."

She grabbed another cup of coffee and settled back in her chair. I'd been mulling something over for the last day or two and this seemed as good as time as any to bring it up. "I know it's kind of short notice but would you be cool with having some people over when Sam's here?" Coyote and I are both kind of territorial about our place. Sam's family and Roy had pretty much become a second brother but what I was planning would be a bit different. There's no hotels near the Reservation so anyone who came over for an extended stay would need a place to crash.

One of her eyebrows went up, "You're really going all out on this aren't you?"

"Yeah, if you're all right with it. It'd probably just be for two days."

"Oliver's crew?"

"That's the plan."

"Sure, it'll be nice to see Felicity again."

We'd road tripped out to Starling once. My descriptions of the Lake House had intrigued her so for her birthday I took her out there and we hung out for a week. She met everyone and we all got along well enough. Her and Felicity bonded pretty fast which had kind of surprised me. The two of them still texted or chatted online at least once a week.

"Thanks."

"Guess it's a good thing we built that spare room."

"Told you it'd come in handy." The third time Sam had stayed for a week he and I came to the conclusion that it was kind of ridiculous for him to sleep on the couch all the time. We both respected Coyote's need to have the second bedroom as her Sacred Space so the next time he came out the three of us and a few neighbors added on another room. It had a king size bed, a pullout couch, a desk, minifridge, a bathroom and seperate entrance in case he ever rolled up super late or early. It'd make things a little less cramped if the entire group showed up.

"You find out how many of them are coming then we'll hit the store tomorrow to stock up " she said, "We'll need enough food to feed a small army, not to mention the alcohol requirements."

"No doubt, we drink enough just out of habit. Give us an actual reason to drink and things are liable to get much worse."

"This I got to see. I've never seen you actually drunk."

"Not sure I can still get falling down dumb ass drunk but I'll take that as a challenge. It's technically a party after all, that's usually what people do."

The smile on her face faded a bit, "Hopefully none of you are depressing drunks, that could get a bit challenging."

"Good point." I gave her a quick kiss before I headed back out to the garage. "Thanks again for letting me get this done today."

"No problem. I'll work on this a bit longer and head out. I'll let you know when I leave."

"Got it."

It'd probably be too early to call Oliver so I spent another hour or so on the paint, Coyote flicked the garage lights to get my attention since the compressor was on and it was hard to hear. I turned around, she was in her construction site clothes. Old ripped up jeans, a long sleeve shirt, boots and her hair was in it's usual braid. I waved back, she nodded and left. I decided it was time to take an actual break. The easy part of painting was done, spraying it on isn't too complicated after all. Now I had to go back through and touch everything up which takes a few hours usually, mainly because I'm a perfectionist when it comes to paint. I figured by now it wouldn't be too obnoxiously early to send Oliver a text telling him to call when he had the time. He and I had gotten a lot closer over the last year since Roy and Sam were hunting together. Both of us worried about them and tended to keep each other updated on what they were doing when they were out on a job. Sam tended to check in more with me than Roy did with Oliver but he did stay in pretty close contact with Thea so one way or another we kept pretty good tabs on them. If all else failed we knew we could always have Felicity track them down if things got bad.

I was just getting ready to head back out to start painting again when my phone rang, "Hey."

"Hey," he replied. "What's up?"

"You guys have anything planned for next Wednesday and Thursday?"

There was a brief pause, "Let me check the Criminals of Starling City Google calendar and see what they've penciled in."

Oliver may not have a huge sense of humor but he can do some pretty mean sarcasm when given the opportunity. "Ha ha. I meant Felicity and her work, Thea taking any trips, you know, life stuff."

"Not that I'm aware of. Why?"

"Sam's birthday is Wednesday, I've got something for him but I was thinking it might be kind of fun to make a thing out of it. So if you guys are available maybe you could come out here. We've got enough space for everyone to crash a night."

"Is this something that you don't want Sam to know about?"

"Pretty much."

"I know Felicity can make herself available, Lyla may not be able to but Dig and Thea and I should all be able to make it. I'll check with Thea in case she's got something going at the club. I'd imagine once we tell Roy he'd just stick with Sam since they're on a job."

"Cool. Well let me know what they say and when you think you'll get here. We may need Felicity to keep closer tabs on them starting Monday and see when he heads this way so he doesn't get here before you guys do. The original plan was for him to show up Wednesday afternoon if the job runs smooth. Course that could all change but they've gotten pretty efficient lately. He texted me yesterday and said they'd narrowed down where the nest could be so they should clean it out within the next day or two."

"Good. I'll get a handle on what everyone is up to and text you the head count."

"Sounds good."

"Dean..."

"Yeah." His voice had gone from all business to a bit more human. Oliver's still a lot more compartmentalized than I ever was. That cold part, the Arrow part, always seemed to be his default mode.

"Thanks for the invite. I know you and Sam usually don't do things like this and it's been years since I've been to a party of any kind. Felicity keeps trying to get me to go out, have some fun and relax but.."

"Dropping your guard in public isn't your thing."

"Exactly."

"Coyote and I are going to go acquire obscene amounts of alcohol so if you want to try to relive your playboy days go for it."

"Well, not sure that would be the best idea but I'll see what I can do."

"Baby steps Oliver."

He laughed, "Got it. Will text you later."

"Sure." We hung up and I got back to work.

Thirty minutes later I got a text from Oliver, "Everyone but Lyla. She's going to stay home and watch Sara. I told Roy, he knows to keep it under wraps. We'll take a later flight out Tuesday, rent a hotel Tuesday night and head towards your place first thing in the morning. We should be there by noon."

"Perfect." I sent back. As soon as I set my phone back down an image of Oliver scowling in a party hat popped in my head. Party hats were now a requirement, I'd get one on his head even if it required Sam and I pinning him down so Dig could put it on.