Prodigal Son

Chapter One

Author's Note:  Posted here, this first chapter is an earlier version but otherwise, what was posted on AO3 under the same title, is the same story that is being posted here.  I will have regular updates until all chapters are posted. (as of 1/7/20) Sorry for the initial delay.  

   

Oliver Queen had never seen the woman before, but he knew who she was before she stepped out of her vehicle. 

No sleek sports car, utilitarian behemoth or mundane sedan would do for the woman who for the past month had been unleashing her sunshine in increasingly fervent voice messages on a near-daily basis. He hadn't thought about what sort of vehicle she'd drive before he heard the crunch of gravel beneath her tires, but the second he saw the cheeky, cherry red, Mini Cooper pulling into his driveway, he knew Felicity Smoak had come to make good on her threat.

She was there to bring him home.

She would fail in her mission. Starling City ceased being home eight years ago when his father's ship foundered in the North China Sea and took with it the footing of his life. He'd left everything behind: friends, family, wealth and occasionally even his name. There was no point in going back anyway. He wasn't the person his family thought they would find. They missed someone he'd gladly stopped being years ago.

Credit where credit was due, his mother's latest minion was different from the others she'd sent. For one, the intriguing Ms. Smoak actually found him at a time when he wasn't looking to be found. He wasn't exactly in hiding, but the cabin was rented in cash under a fake name and the phones she'd left message after message on were burners. He still had the listed business line as well, but after the sale went through, he hadn't bothered to answer it anymore. He'd checked the old company phone for messages though, and mixed among the cranks and requests for interviews he was never going to give, had been her first message.

She'd introduced herself with a bright smile in her voice and then promised to call his other line. At first, he figured she'd waste her time dialing phones he'd decided to let the guys from the crew keep, but to his surprise on his drive to the cabin, her name and number flashed up on the phone he'd purchased at a random gas station. Nobody had that number.

Maybe curiosity explained why he'd listened to her next few messages multiple times before deleting them. Then, something more interesting than paranoia prompted him to buy another burner and as he'd oddly hoped, she switched to leaving messages on the new phone. It went back and forth after that. Didn't matter which phone he was using that day, through that phone her daily call came. He'd been impressed on top of his ever-growing curiosity. A couple weeks in, as the coveted solitude at the cabin crept toward boredom, he realized her calls were the highlight of his day.

They'd begun as brief, bright, cajoling requests, framing his eight-year absence as a misunderstanding that could now be left in the past. When that netted her no response, she promised him a golden opportunity on his return, though, she'd stopped short - and thereby again marked herself different from the rest - by not promising him a full restoration to his trust fund and inheritance. Usually, his mom's lawyers and investigators led with that.

The third week she channeled Uncle Sam and her messages were a call to duty and came peppered with lectures on family, responsibility, and fidelity. Felicity Smoak should have sounded like a crackpot, but optimistic sincerity rang in every word. Hell, the sincerity alone should have told him she was a crackpot. Jury remained out on that, but last week she brought out the heavy artillery. It was a gut punch.

"Thea needs you."

It hurt to think about his sweet and sassy little sister. Thea was young when he left, not far from thirteen, and he thought about her every day, but she'd been part of the reason he'd gone. She loved him. Looked up to him. Two outstanding reasons for him to stay far away.