Home: An Arrow Fanfic

Chapter 5

Felicity walked into Oliver's hideout while giving herself a stern talking to. Work. This is work. No getting personal. No blurring the lines. He's my employer. I am his employee. I will be courteous, friendly and professional. She nodded, satisfied. Courteous, friendly, professional. She kept repeating it, like a mantra, as she fished her tablet out of her large handbag. Courteous, friendly, professional. The last thing she needed was for him to see through her walls.

"Morning, Felicity," Diggle grunted.

Diggle and Oliver were in sweats. They looked like they were in the middle of a sparring session if the moisture clinging to their bodies was anything to go by.

Keeping her gaze focussed on some point beyond Oliver's ear so that she didn't drool at the sight of his naked torso, she addressed neither one of them in particular. "Do you guys live here? Seriously. You're always here." When both of them just continued sparring, she rolled her eyes and walked toward her workstation. "Of course you're always here."

Hooking her tablet up to the internet, Felicity was acutely aware of Oliver shuffling around behind her. She could hear the rapid changes in their breathing as skin connected with skin, each trading blows. She could tell which one was Oliver based solely on the swiftness of his movements in relation to Diggle. The man was a machine and his body was a fortress.

Not that keeping her back to him stopped her overactive imagination from running wild. She'd seen enough to know how his body moved - how he changed direction seamlessly as he went through his martial arts routines, how his muscled arms adjusted without effort as he brandished different weapons, how his legs moved with power and speed as he practiced hand to hand combat.

Sometimes she had to catch herself from just staring at him. It was fascinating to see him stretch his body to its limits, sometimes without even breaking a sweat.

"Nice try, Dig," she heard Oliver say as someone, presumably Diggle, hit the ground.

"Man, I was sure you wouldn't see that one coming."

They laughed.

Feeling a body behind her, Felicity froze. Instinctively she knew it was Oliver. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and her palms became sweaty. She could feel his body heat rolling off him in waves. Courteous, friendly, professional.

"Find anything on Malcolm yet?"

"I'm just activating the tech Dig planted. Everything else I've already got access to." She felt bereft as he moved to stand beside her. "Cellphone records, GPS, wire taps, micro transmitters."

She checked the signal strength on all the objects they were tracking. Everything was working. "Thus far, there's nothing out of the ordinary. Business meetings with members of his Board of Directors, a haircut, a new suit fitting, lunch with Tommy. All run of the mill." She punched a few keys. "Right now, he's in his office," she punched some more keys, "on a conference call with a Deon van Wyk and a Portia Botha in South Africa."

Taking a break from guzzling down copious amounts of water, Diggle chimed in. "Looks like Malcolm Merlyn believes in diversity, if nothing else."

Felicity flashed a smile in Dig's direction as she switched computer screens and called up the two South Africans' profiles. "They're software buyers based in Johannesburg, no priors, no records." She scanned the reports a second time and then added, "We can listen in if you want?"

Oliver had been acutely aware of Felicity from the second she came in. She reminded him of cotton candy, dressed in pink, her short skirt showing her legs off to perfection. Something he'd never noticed a week before. He also observed that she seemed completely unaware of him. The knowledge stung. He'd arrived that morning worried that he may have hurt her feelings. Evidently he was mistaken. It was as if that moment between them the previous night had never happened. He should have been relieved, but for some reason he didn't care to analyse, he wasn't.