"Back from shopping and no packages? Who are you, and what have you done with my girlfriend?" Version one, cute and trying to take the edge off a bad day. Version two? "Nothing suited my sensibilities," Blair says tellingly, and Chuck says he couldn't negotiate with the terrorists that are Jack. He made an offer -- "Nothing I would ever consider" -- and Blair hopes against hope that once Jack sees he can't get what he wants, whatever that is, he'll stop fucking around. Version one: Sheer optimism, a glance of candlelight in the dark. Version two: Falling right into the trap. Of course, right then Chuck gets the call that Jack's just straight-up selling the Empire: No more games. Clutch time.

Upstairs, Blair gets a package from Jack; the dress S picked out, with a note: One last chance to save your man -- Jack. Then, "Heart" by Bertie Blackman plays over the next few beats, which is good. Kind of a boring song, but the type that sets mood while relating to every single thing that happens, which you know I love.

This road feels rough under my shoes
Crunching and gritting all that we hold true

S runs around, everybody's trying to find Nate. They have Vanya and Dorota spying through every doorman in the city -- way to use the Upstairs, Downstairs thing as another level of the GG surveillance thing -- which means more obnoxious racism: "Dorota has pretty much the entire Eastern Bloc on lookout!" But nothing there, and nothing from GG, yet. Jenny's plan is working, but Jenny's plan: What is it? Just be darling while they go on their secretly-a-date, and then hand him over to S when it's time for the party? Ah, no: She's going to use the party itself, this is just a warmup. Game recognizes game, Little J.

And if you get your hands and hold them just so
You might feel different and out of control

Blair runs up to S for some awesome: "Serena, come here. You've done some unforgivable things, like having sex with Nate when we were saving ourselves for each other, or killing Pete Fairman... [Serena's response, of course, is brilliant, one of the funniest moments in the episode] How far is too far? Where is that place you can't come back from anymore?" Serena, of course, immediately locates the problem, but thinks it has to do with Chuck attacking Jack in some way. Blair fusses around and around about answering the questions -- prostitutes are people too, B! -- but just waves her hand around in front of S's face to distract her: "The point is, if someone does something awful, but it's for love, is it okay?" No. You've still done something awful. The ends are the means, always. It's how we stay human.