While everything was occurring in the Grey Gull, an oblivious Nathan and Audrey were upstairs watching a horror movie. Neither one of them could explain why they watched such a genre after what they saw every day. Maybe they liked the predictability of them, or the idea that perhaps things could be even weirder. Or maybe they just liked the excuse to cuddle on the couch together during the 'scary' bits.

Part way through the movie, they heard movement downstairs, but figured it was just Duke, coming to open the bar and didn't think much of it.

Jennifer's first cry for help could not have been more poorly timed. She cried out at the exact moment the female protagonist screamed so loud that Nathan jumped. Audrey, however, wasn't sure if she actually heard her name being called, or if her mind was playing tricks on her because of the movie.

"Did you hear something?" she asked Nathan.

"All I heard was that scream," he replied, rubbing his ear. "Maybe we should turn this down just a bit." He lowered the volume on the TV, and went to rest his arm across Audrey's shoulders. The two of them had been through a lot with the whole Audrey is Mara situation, but it had brought them closer than ever.

But now Audrey was distracted. Something was wrong. She got up and went over to the window, seeing two cars in the parking lot. One she recognized, and one she didn't.

"Hey, Nathan. Do you recognize that car?"

Nathan walked over next to her and peered out the window. "No. Could be a friend of Jennifer's or something. The colors match Massachusetts plates."

"Maybe." Audrey wasn't convinced.

"Hey." Nathan began rubbing her shoulders. "What's wrong?"

"I don't know. Something just doesn't feel right."

The next time someone screamed, it was unmistakable.

"AUDREY!"

Jennifer. It had come from outside. Audrey spared Nathan a quick glance before both of them bolted for the door.

Audrey was the first one out the door and was met with the sight of a man sitting on top of an obviously hurt and distressed Jennifer at the bottom of the stairs. She also saw the knife that was plunged into Jennifer's stomach. "Hey!" she called out to distract the man's attention away from the girl.

"Shit!" he called out before he took off in the other direction, taking the knife with him. Dammit. She had really hoped he would have left that in, knowing it was a really bad idea to pull out whatever it was that caused a penetrating wound.

Audrey ran to Jennifer as Nathan, who had the sense to grab his gun before coming out, ran after her attacker.

"Jennifer? Jennifer, it's Audrey. It's okay. It's going to be okay. Just hang in there!" She pulled off her jacket and pressed it against the wound to try and stop the bleeding. There was a lot of bleeding. Jennifer sucked in a breath as Audrey applied pressure. She was in obvious pain. Probably more pain than Audrey could even imagine. There was a cut on her head and a bruise forming on her cheek. Her dress had been cut open far enough for Audrey to see some of the bruising on her abdomen as well. Audrey was so thankful they hadn't been another minute later or decided to go out to the movies like they had originally planned. She could only imagine what might have happened to Jennifer if she and Nathan hadn't gotten there when they did.

Jennifer's eyes began to drift closed and her head lolled to the side.

"Jennifer! Stay with me Jennifer!" Jennifer tried to open her eyes a few times, but never succeeded and after a few attempts gave up. "Nathan!" Audrey called out. She heard a car drive away before Nathan came running up the stairs.

"He drove off but I got the license plate. How is she?"

"She's really bad, Nathan! We need to get her to the hospital!"

"I'll call an ambulance."

"No. There's no time. We have to take her ourselves. Help me get her in the car."

Nathan lifted a limp Jennifer and rushed her to the backseat of his car. Audrey ran back to the apartment to grab the keys and their cell phones before getting into the back of the car with Jennifer, still trying to slow the bleeding with the now soaked through jacket. Jennifer drifted in and out of consciousness for the ride. Every time she was awake, she said one, and only one, thing.

"Duke," she would manage to choke out. "Where's Duke?"

She'd be back out before Audrey even had a chance to give her an answer. Which was probably for the best. She had tried to get a hold of Duke multiple times, but his phone went straight to voicemail. This was not news she wanted to leave him as a message.

Jennifer had been completely unconscious for eight minutes when they finally reached the hospital. Nathan lifted her out of the back seat and ran into the emergency room, leaving the car illegally parked just outside.

"Help! We need some help over here!" Audrey called out, and immediately upon seeing how much blood there was, they were brought a gurney and surrounded by nurses and doctors.

"What happened?"

Nathan jumped in, "She was attacked. Her attacker was on top of her with a knife in her stomach when we found them. He pulled it out and ran once he saw us."

They started hooking Jennifer up to machines and sticking needles in her and throwing around a lot of words that Audrey couldn't understand. It wasn't long before they pushed her and Nathan out of the room and into the hallway.

She took a deep breath, breathing for what felt like the first time since they found Jennifer. Nathan came up and wrapped his arms around her. She returned the embrace.

"She'll be okay," Nathan tried to comfort her. Audrey nodded but was not convinced. He led them to a couple of nearby chairs.

"I just keep thinking of what we could have done," Audrey admitted. "What if we didn't have the movie up so loud? We might have heard something earlier. What if I had trusted my instincts and checked outside the first time I thought I heard something instead of just looking out the window? How much of this could we have prevented?"

Nathan grasped her hand. "You'll drive yourself crazy with the what-ifs. There's nothing we can do to prevent what happened. What we can do now is be here to help her and Duke through the aftermath."

Audrey nodded again. "Oh my god, Duke!" She realized she had forgotten Duke still had no idea what had happened. "Nathan, we need to find Duke." She stood up quickly and Nathan followed suit. She turned back towards the door, but then back to the room where Jennifer was being treated. Someone should stay here with her.

Nathan put his hands on her shoulders to steady her from turning back and forth between the two points. "You stay here and watch over Jennifer, I'll go find Duke and bring him here. You should also call Dwight and get him to start processing the Gull."

She smiled at him, thanking him for finding a solution to the problem without her even voicing it. He kissed her before walking towards the door. "Nathan," she called out after him. He turned back around. "Duke's going to be pissed." They both knew how protective he was of Jennifer. How much her cared for her.

"Yeah. He is."

"Don't let him do anything stupid."

"I'll do my best."

He walked through the hospital doors and Audrey turned around just in time to see the hospital workers pushing Jennifer out of her room.

She rushed over. "What's going on? Where are you taking her?"

One of the nurses broke away and came over to Audrey. The doctors can't quite locate the source of the bleeding so they're taking her to the O.R. for an emergency laparotomy."

"Surgery? Is she going to be okay?"

"The doctor will do everything she can." She gave Audrey a small smile before heading down the hall after Jennifer.

It wasn't an answer, but it was the non-answer Audrey had been expecting. She sat back down in the waiting room, burying her face in her hands, hoping everything would work out.

She took a deep breath to compose herself before pulling out her phone to call Dwight.

"Hey Audrey. I thought you and Nathan were taking the night off. What's up?"

"Unfortunately I'm on the other side of this police thing today. I need to report an assault."

"What? What happened? Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm fine. It's Jennifer. She was attacked at the Gull. Nathan and I heard her scream and found the guy on top of her with a knife. I'm at the hospital now. They just took her into surgery."

"God. Do you know who did it? It wasn't Duke, was it?"

"No. We all know Duke wouldn't harm so much as a hair on that girl's head. It was some guy I'd never seen before. Nathan got his license plate. He went to go find Duke but I'll have him send it to you as soon as he can."

"Okay. I'll send a couple guys down to the Gull to start looking it over. I have some stuff I'm dealing with here, but as soon as I can I'll come down and get statements from you and Nathan, and Jennifer when she feels up to it again."

"Stuff? What kind of stuff? Trouble stuff?"

"Don't even think about worrying about it. You just make sure Jennifer's okay and that whoever did this to her doesn't come back. And Audrey?"

"Yeah?"

"Jennifer's strong. She'll make it through this."

Audrey shook her head. "I don't know, Dwight. She lost a lot of blood."

"Just have a little faith. She'll be okay. I'll be there as soon as I can."

"Okay. Bye, Dwight."

Audrey hung up her phone, collapsed back into her chair, and did the only thing she could. Wait.

Duke pulled into the Grey Gull an hour after he had originally planned on being at dinner with Jennifer. He saw her car in the parking lot and smiled. He had figured she would turn up here. He would have called her and told her he was going to be even later as soon as he realized the traffic he was caught in was due to an accident that needed to be cleared, but his phone had died and she had his car charger.

He grabbed the bag of stuff he had purchased in the city, shoving it in his coat pocket as he started towards the bar. He stopped in his tracks when he noticed the door wide open. The speed of his walking increased as he headed inside.

"Jennifer?!" he called out in a panic. He noticed her stuff on the bar and immediately ran over to it. He checked everywhere. Behind the bar. In the back room. Hell, he even looked under the tables, half of which were set up and ready for opening, the other half weren't. He assumed Jennifer had started to open the bar for him, but then stopped or was interrupted.

He went back outside, trying to figure out where she might have gone. He started towards Nathan and Audrey's apartment hoping she was up there, when he noticed the trail of blood. He doesn't know how he didn't see it earlier. There was a lot of it. His heart pounded as he slowly walked towards the steps and saw the pool of blood. God there was a lot of blood! He stumbled backwards, panicking and fearing the worst had happened to Jennifer. He vowed then and there that he'd kill Alec the next time he laid eyes on him. There was no doubt in Duke's mind that he was behind this. He found himself hoping that by some string of luck the blood was Alec's and not Jennifer's, but the feeling in his gut was telling him otherwise. He ran his hands through his hair and looked around, trying to figure out where she might be.

When Nathan pulled back into the parking lot Duke was just heading back to his car to go towards the logical location to check, the hospital, embarrassed he hadn't thought of it sooner. When he noticed Nathan, Duke stopped and rushed over to him.

"Where's Jennifer?" He got right to the point.

Nathan got out of the car, leaving it running, and held out a hand to try and calm Duke, who was obviously on edge. "She's at the hospital. She was attacked. Audrey and I found her. She's still at the hospital with Jennifer."

Duke let out a breath, but was still pacing in panic mode. "Okay. Okay. I have to get there." He started walking to his truck when Nathan grabbed his arm to stop him.

"I don't really think you're in the right state of mind to drive. Get in." Duke had to agree.

The majority of the ride was silent, until Duke broke it.

"What did the bastard do to her?"

Nathan wasn't sure if it was the best time to tell him, but figured it was going to happen sooner or later. Better sooner rather than later. "We're not really sure. She was beaten pretty badly and… he had stabbed her in the stomach. She lost a lot of blood, Duke." Duke didn't respond, but his hands clenched into tight fists in his lap. "Do you know who did this to her?"

"A dead man." Nathan could hear the seriousness in his voice and didn't push the issue just yet. He'd wait until Jennifer was out of the woods and Duke was in a better state of mind. Now was probably not a good time to ask him questions about a man he obviously, and justifiably, wanted to kill.

When they got to the hospital, Duke rushed inside and looked around for someone to tell him where Jennifer was. He spotted Audrey sitting in the waiting room.

"Where is she?"

"She's in surgery."

"Surgery?!" Nathan hadn't said anything about surgery.

"She was stabbed pretty deep and they needed to go in to stop the bleeding."

Duke started pacing the waiting room and Nathan and Audrey planted themselves in a couple of chairs.

About an hour and a half later, a doctor came out into the waiting room and walked over to Audrey, Nathan, and Duke, who had finally given up pacing and sat down next to them, appreciating the comfort as Audrey held his hand.

"Are you here for Jennifer Mason?" the doctor asked.

All three stood up. "Yeah," Duke said anxiously. "Is she okay?"

"We were able to find the source of and stop the bleeding. The knife must have been twisted because there was a lot more tearing than there should have been, which was why it took so long. She also has a few broken ribs and a severe concussion."

"Is she going to be okay?" Duke repeated.

"She's not out of the woods yet. She was unconscious when she came in and hasn't woken up yet after the surgery. I'm worried the concussion is worse than we originally thought."

"She's had one before. She told me she woke up in the hospital after two days with no idea how she got there."

"Having a previous concussion can definitely exacerbate the symptoms." She made a few notes on Jennifer's chart.

"When can I see her?"

"She's still in recovery but as soon as you can see her we'll let you know."

"Dr. Kingston," Audrey chimed in, "the man who did this to her is still out there and he may come after her again. Nathan here and I are cops and we're putting a police detail on her. So one of us needs to be with her at all times."

The doctor's gaze passed between Nathan and Duke before finally settling back on Audrey. She nodded.

"Thank you," Audrey said. Nathan gave Audrey his gun before she followed the doctor back to Jennifer's bed, leaving Duke and Nathan in the waiting room, where Duke resumed his pacing.

Nathan tried to get information from him again. "Who did this to her, Duke?"

"I need to get some fresh air." And with that, Duke was out the door.