Work Text:
Felicity looked at the clock on her computer as she heard the elevator doors opening. “You’re early!”
Oliver stopped in front of her desk. “It’s 10:15.”
She stepped around the desk, handing him the packet of notes she prepared for him daily. “Exactly.” She wrinkled her brow as she inspected the faintly checkered pattern of his pressed dress shirt.
“Everything okay?” His tone suggested annoyance, but Felicity didn’t care. He had forced her to take this EA position, and she was going to make him pay for that in every way she could think of.
She looked up with a forced-pleasant smile. “Yes, Mr. Queen. Just making sure you’re not still wearing last night’s shirt.”
Oliver looked mildly scandalized.
“I mean - I just mean I don’t know if you ever made it home after last night. Obviously I mean after you were with me. I mean not with me. But maybe you were with someone else. Not that it’s my business. But you are the CEO, and I’m your Executive Assistant, and I consider it part of my job to make sure you look presentable.” Unconsciously, she had reached up and was in the act of unnecessarily smoothing the crisp collar of his shirt before she realized what she was doing. Her fingers froze where they were, and she couldn’t stop her eyes from drifting up to meet his.
They were standing very close. Oliver was calmly looking back at her with a neutral expression. “And do I look presentable?”
With the question, something had changed very slightly in his face and Felicity felt a sudden and strong urge to reassure him that he could never look anything less, but then she remembered that she had gone to M.I.T. and this job was beneath her and Oliver still had a lot to pay for. She pursed her lips and patted him lightly on the chest as she turned away. “You’ll do.”
* * * * * * *
Felicity got up and paced to her office door before she remembered that her pacing would not reflect well on QC. Not when any of the potential investors who were currently waiting for their CEO to show up might see her.
With a regard for her company’s reputation that its CEO apparently did not share, she forced herself to sit back down. It was 4:19 PM. The investors had been waiting nearly twenty minutes, and as loathe as she was to admit it, she was grateful that Isabel Rochev was there to begin the meeting, though Oliver’s absence was rapidly becoming a Problem.
So it was with a rush of relief that Felicity saw Oliver emerge from the elevator and stride toward her. She ran at him and shoved a stack of papers into his chest.
“They’re in there?”
“Isabel’s warmed them up. Huh - there’s a sentence I never thought I’d say. Hey, wait -” she laid her hand on his arm to stop his headlong rush into the conference room. “Take a minute and prepare.” She grabbed his arm that held her packet and flipped to the relevant page. “This is the part they’re going to want to hear from you. The R&D stuff we went over last week, do you remember?”
Oliver nodded, his eyes skimming the page. He took a centering breath, then looked at her. “Thanks.”
Felicity blinked. “You’re welcome. Oh - hey.” She reached up and straightened his crooked tie. “There.” Her fingers slid down to signal she had fixed it.
“Presentable?”
She pressed a tiny smile. “Presentable.”
* * * * * * *
It was 8:48 in the morning and Felicity was enjoying the quietest and most productive part of her day. She had never really been a morning person, but since becoming Oliver’s Executive Assistant, she had learned to appreciate the moments before sixteen different department heads arrived in the building and began clamoring for her attention.
She was so engrossed in her work that she failed to notice, until he was standing right next to her, that Oliver had made an unprecedented early morning appearance. “Hey.”
She jumped and nearly knocked over her coffee. “Oliver. What are you doing here?” He was standing so close that she had to crane her head way back to look at his face. What she saw, when she did, made her gasp. “Oh my god, Oliver!” She stood up quickly, forcing him to back up, barely.
“Eh, is it really that bad?” He made no move to get out of her personal space.
Unthinkingly, she reached out with both hands to cradle his face, tracing the outline of his very noticeable black eye with one finger. “It’s awful.” She quickly intercepted his dismayed look. “I mean not awful - just pretty bad.” She smiled in self-conscious acknowledgement that that wasn’t really any better. “What happened?”
“Eh. Couldn’t sleep last night.” His gaze was focused somewhere over her shoulder.
Felicity physically turned his head, which she still held between her hands, until he was forced to look at her. “You went out? Without backup?”
“It wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle.” She felt his jaw clench under her fingers.
“There’s nothing you can’t handle, Oliver. That’s not the point.”
He held her eyes for a long moment before the steely look in his eyes suddenly subsided. Instead of offering any further excuses, he shrugged and Felicity unexpectedly found herself ready for battle but with no one to fight. Unbalanced, she simply looked at him, still cupping his face in her hands.
After a long moment she took a deep breath, feeling she had come to a decision but not knowing what it was. “I have some concealer in my purse. It’s pretty good at covering bruises.”
She pulled her hands away as she began to turn, but Oliver’s hands wrapping around her wrists stopped her. She looked up questioningly, and was surprised to see that his eyes held an intensity that was rarely directed at her. “Oliver…?”
“How do you know that?” He seemed suddenly to be barely containing some particular rage, and Felicity wondered what could possibly have set him off.
Even so, she could never be afraid of him. “How do I know what?”
As he continued to look back at her with her wrists in his grasp, his eyes softened. “How do you know that concealer covers bruises? Have you…”
Felicity sucked in a shallow breath as she realized what Oliver had assumed. “No! I…” She licked her dry lips and consciously pulled away, needing space in order to regain her composure. This time, Oliver let her go. “I have heard it said. By my mother, probably. She’s always good for make-up tips.” She looked back at Oliver to make sure her lame attempt to lighten the mood had reassured him.
“Good.” His shoulders had lowered but his posture remained stiff. Damn that man and his all-purpose stoicism.
“Okay! Well, come here. This is probably not going to be my finest work, but thankfully you don’t have any meetings this morning, and I think I can reschedule your afternoon.” She grabbed the edges of his suit coat and hauled him down into her chair. “This is going to be,” she lightly dobbed a bit of concealer onto the thin skin under Oliver’s eye, “fun!”
Oliver huffed and shook his head. “Fun.”
“Hey!” With her left hand, Felicity grabbed his chin and held it still. “No moving, Mr. Hold still. If this is going to work, you’re just going to have to trust me.” Felicity chewed her bottom lip and applied another dab, then patted it lightly with her fingertip in order to create a natural blend. After several more applications, Oliver winced. She met his eyes. “Ooh, yeah, sorry. Kinda forgot that there’s a bruise under there. Bright side, it’s working?”
Oliver continued to look at her, but he didn’t seem to have heard what she said. She raised her eyebrows questioningly. “I do trust you.”
His sincerity caught her off guard. She flushed with a small smile, then turned around quickly to hide her reaction. She exchanged the concealer for some powder and turned back around with Purpose. “This will set it, and then you’ll be back to looking like everybody’s favorite GQ CEO.”
He was still looking at her with an indefinable expression. “You mean presentable?”
She let her head fall to the side dramatically, signalling that she knew he was mocking her. “Yes, Mr. Queen.” She took a large step forward into his space and leaned down so he could see how very much his charm did not work on her. “Positively adequate.”
* * * * * * *
Felicity suppressed a sigh of annoyance. If there was one thing she hated most about her “promotion,” it was that it forced her to interact with the types of people she had happily been able to ignore while working in the IT department. Christy Benson, the Chief Investment Officer’s EA, was one such person. She had been here for ten minutes, and Felicity could not make her go away.
“Ms. Benson, as I already told you, I don’t think it’s appropriate for us to be discussing Mr. Queen’s personal life.”
“Ugh, Ms. Smoak, you’re so stiff. I feel bad for Mr. Queen. It’s like he’s on another island up here with you. Down on the lower floors we are a lot more relaxed. We talk to each other, we go out, we have parties. I honestly don’t know what we’d do if we all acted like you.”
“Work. You’d do work. You know, since Mr. Queen is running late, you could go back to your fun floor and I can just call you when he gets here.”
“Eh, it’s okay. Nothing’s going on down there today anyway. Most of our finance guys were at a bachelor party last night and they called in sick this morning. It’s basically a funeral down there without them. So. As I was saying. You must know a little more about his mysterious time on that island than most people, huh? I mean, it’s no secret you spend a lot of time with him, and I’m sure you can’t always be talking about work.” Christy was looking at Felicity like she wasn’t sure she believed her own words.
For the third time in as many minutes, Felicity answered Christy with a long, silent stare.
“Look, I’m not saying I’m one of those people who believe you slept your way into this position -”
Felicity’s elevated eyebrows shot even higher.
Christy stood up from her chair and leaned over Felicity’s desk, attempting to appear concerned. “You did know that that’s what some people think right?”
Felicity couldn’t stop the look of disdain that swept across her previously neutral face. As she rolled her eyes, she glimpsed Oliver making his way from the elevator. “I’ve heard the rumors, yeah,” she said dryly.
Felicity fixed Oliver with a dead-eyed stare as he slipped quietly into the office. She was going to make him pay for this, and from the apologetic way he bit his lower lip, he knew it.
Christy continued talking, unaware that her CEO, with his ninja-like skills, had entered the room. “I mean, he obviously has a type, and you’re not it, no offense.” Lost in her own thoughts, Christy didn’t notice that Felicity was focused on someone behind her.
Felicity held Oliver’s eyes as Christy continued speaking. “It must have been so lonely for him on that island. So he’s really never opened up to you? I guess he just needs to find the right person to talk to, someone who will really listen to him.”
Oliver’s eyes were raised in a mixture of alarm and amusement. Felicity blinked back at him, enjoying watching him realize just how much she regularly shielded him from this sort of thing. Finally he spoke.
“I’m sorry I’m late. Am I interrupting something?” His voice was as smooth as bourbon, and he looked only at Felicity.
Slipping effortlessly into her role, Felicity smiled pleasantly at her boss. “Nothing important, Mr. Queen. Ms. Benson is here to brief you on the quarter’s projected earnings ahead of next week’s stockholder meeting.”
Oliver still looked confused.
“Since Mr. Chatwal had a family emergency and was unable to come in today, you’ll receive the briefing from his Executive Assistant.”
Oliver’s face cleared. “I see. I apologize for being late, Ms…?” For the first time, Oliver looked at Christy.
“Benson.” She extended her hand to Oliver. “Christy Benson.” She at least had the grace to look guilty at having been caught gossiping about Oliver.
Oliver stared down at Christy’s hand for longer than was strictly polite before taking it in a firm, brief shake. He opened his office door and gestured her inside. “Let’s get to it.” He continued to hold the door as Felicity stepped through, tablet in hand.
Ten minutes later Oliver stood up as Felicity finished typing in her final notes from Christy’s report. “Thank you, Ms. Bennet -”
“Benson,” Felicity corrected from her chair.
“Benson, sorry.” Oliver flashed his trademarked grin at Christy as he continued toward Felicity’s chair. His movement and vaguely extended hand signalled that the meeting was over, and Christy stood up and gathered her notes a little more slowly than was necessary. Oliver stopped behind Felicity and rested his hands on the back of her chair, waiting for Christy to leave. He watched her depart and pressed his lips together in a small parting smile as she slipped out the door. For her part, Felicity did not look up from her tablet until Christy was gone.
Once they were alone, Oliver reached down and deliberately poked Felicity’s shoulder with his index finger. “Hey.”
Felicity immediately stopped typing and lifted her head.
Oliver poked her again.
Felicity set the tablet on his desk and swiveled her chair so she could look up at him. She crossed her arms, leaned back, and waited for him to speak.
“About what she said.”
Felicity waited, but he didn’t immediately elaborate. “Which part, the part about me not being your type, or the part about me not being someone you could open up to?”
Oliver looked at her with the hint of a smile that Felicity had gotten pretty good at detecting.
Felicity waited.
His smile deepened by a fraction, but his expression otherwise did not change. “She’s wrong, you know.” His eyes shifted to fix on some point behind her for a moment before he looked back at her with his customary expression in place. “Lunch?”
Felicity looked down at her hands in her lap for a moment before deciding to chock it up to one of his moods. “Yeah. I readied our orders, I just have to place it. That Fusion place okay? It’s Tuesday.” She stood up and grabbed her tablet.
“Tuesday Fusion!” He stepped back to let Felicity return to her office. “Oh, hey, wait!”
Felicity tried to turn toward him, but his hands were on her shoulders. Her mostly-bare shoulders. “What are you -” He was unsnapping the clasp of her dress at the back of her neck. She consciously regulated her breathing and tried to suppress her physical reaction to the sensation.
“Your strap is twisted.” He was untwisting it himself. “There.” Seemingly oblivious to the intimacy of the act, his hands drifted over her shoulders and neck as he refastened the clasp and then spun her by the shoulders to face him.
Felicity found herself looking up at Oliver, his hands still holding her close and in place. Something in his eyes, however, suggested that he wasn’t entirely unaware or unaffected by what he’d done. She couldn’t help but crinkle her nose and shake her head in bafflement. “Why…?”
“You’re the CEO’s Executive Assistant. We gotta have you looking presentable.”
She lifted her eyebrow slowly and returned his direct look, letting the moment linger. Without breaking their gaze, she lifted her fingers to adjust his perfectly-done tie. “Gotta keep up appearances.”
The corners of Oliver’s mouth turned up in a barely-there smile, but Felicity saw it.