Page 95 of Stuart Woods' Golden Hour

Teddy rewatched the video of the assassin’s arrival and noted that the man who’d retrieved the clothes had entered the lobby a few seconds after the assassin, and in the company of a third man.

The second man received a phone call prior to going to the locker room, and another right before he and his friend left the building. Something that occurred less than a minute after the assassin had done the same.

Teddy pulled screenshots of each man’s face and texted them to Rick, then finally returned to the Ritz-Carlton.

Before going to his suite, he stopped by room 321 and used Danielle’s key card to enter.

Save for an envelope sitting on a nightstand, the room appeared unused, which meant the envelope had to be what Danielle had wanted him to find. He checked all the cabinets and obvious hiding spots and discovered nothing else. He took the envelope up to Mark Weldon’s suite, since that’s who he needed to be in the morning.

After reading Danielle’s note, he understood why she’d shown up at the shoot. She had seen the same men Teddy had.

Unlike Teddy, however, she knew who two of them were. One was part of the team that had been pursuing her in Romania. She didn’t know his name, but she did provide a short description that aligned with the guy who’d remained in the hospital lobby the entire time.

Her description of the second man matched her would-be assassin, and his name she did know.

Dieter Wenz.

Vesna’s ex, and Felix Braun’s right-hand man.

35

The next morning, Tessa andMark were on the set of a morning talk show, sitting across from the show’s hosts.

The assistant director counted down from three on his fingers, then pointed at the female host.

The woman smiled at the camera and spoke for several seconds in Hungarian. Her male counterpart jumped in, and they laughed at a joke neither Mark nor Tessa understood.

The two hosts continued interacting for another half minute and then turned to Mark and Tessa.

The female host said in English, “Tessa Tweed and Mark Weldon, thank you so much for joining us today. We are so very pleased to have you here.”

“Not as pleased as we are to be here,” Tessa said.

The interview was being conducted entirely in English, the translation occurring via voice-over from a sound booth elsewhere in the studio.

For most of the allotted time, the interview went as expected, the hosts tossing out softball questions aboutStorm’s Eyeand Hollywood in general, and Mark and Tessa answering with witty anecdotes and behind-the-scenes stories.

Things changed near the end, when the male host said, “Tessa, I hope you don’t mind, but I wanted to ask how you are doing after your ordeal last night.”

“Oh,” she said, caught off guard. “I’m fine. Thank you for asking.”

Lizzie had told her and Mark that she requested the interview stick toStorm’s Eye, since that was the reason they’d been booked, and had been assured by a producer that would be the case.

“For those watching who haven’t heard,” the man said, “last night there was a shooting in Pest, in the vicinity of a commercial that was being filmed, featuring Tessa and pop sensation Mari Chen.” He turned back to Tessa. “Did you see what happened?”

“From where I was standing, I could only see people running around. I didn’t even hear a gunshot and didn’t know what was going on until later.”

“We understand the victim had broken through the crowd barrier and was running toward you.”

“I don’t know if that’s true or not. I never saw her.”

Though the host was doing a good job hiding it, Mark could tell he was frustrated that he wasn’t scoring the scoop he’d thought he would.

Trying a different tactic, he said, “Mark, did you see anything?”

“Sorry, no. I was at the hotel and didn’t even know anything had happened until this morning.”

“Has there been any word on how the victim is doing?” Tessa asked.

---