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but Ridge held his gaze without flinching, even as he dropped his ignored, proffered hand and wiped it on his jeans as if he had never raised it in the first place.
    “Please, Ghasan. If we could just have a moment.” Alexana motioned toward their “couches,” inviting him to join them.
    With a sigh, the elderly man moved forward. Ridge sat down again after giving Ghasan a polite smile as if he weren’t offended, and Alexana turned before he could see her admiring grin. It took guts to look into Ghasan’s eyes and not cower.
    Alexana left the men to size each another up and went to an old white Frigidaire in the corner. She helped herself to three bottled Cokes, ignoring the filthy handle and black fingerprints all over the relic’s thick door.
    She returned, impishly smiling first at one man, then the other. The young girl joined them again to open the bottles.
    Ghasan spoke first. “You were never one to keep company with journalists, Alexana,” he said, keeping his eyes on Ridge.
    “It wasn’t my first choice.”
    “Oh, no? Is this man blackmailing you?”
    “In a way,” she said calmly, holding Ridge’s gaze. “But don’t worry about me. I don’t plan on keeping company with him for long.”
    Ridge looked momentarily irritated, then his face was expressionless once again.
    Alexana drank deeply from her bottle. “I’m showing him the real Jerusalem, Ghasan, and I’d like for you to tell him what you think of the peace process.”
    “The Israelis are dogs, but we are tired,” Ghasan said without preamble, warming to his old, well-rehearsed diatribe. “We are tired of burying our women and children, so we agree to ‘peace,’ to certain borders, certain rights. Now, after the so-called peace we still bury our children and the Israelis still eat at our borders, ‘settling’ more villages while being protected by the government, for which our own soldiers are mere puppets.”
    Ridge frowned as he listened to Ghasan lament the murder of friends and family members. The old Palestinian had many stories that no news correspondent had ever covered.
    Ghasan excused himself twenty minutes later, rising to greet other guests.
    “How reliable is he?” Ridge asked Alexana when the man was out of earshot.
    “Very.”
    “He did not appreciate your bringing me here.”
    “Journalists are notorious these days for telling slanted stories,” Alexana said, digging into her “pizza” made of a thin crust, olive oil, eggs, and vegetables. “They denounced their pledge to report the news without bias long ago.”
    Ridge raised his eyebrow. “Why do you think that?”
    “I’ve seen it over and over. American dollars help fund the Israeli military, and many of those dollars belong to wealthy businessmen who have powerful friends among politicians and the media.”
    “Fabulous,” Ridge said, a trace of bitterness entering his tone. “The old ‘you can’t trust the media anymore’ story.”
    “Well, can you?”
    “Are you suggesting that the American media has been deliberately biased in their reporting?”
    “I’m saying that it is human nature to choose a side, no matter how hard you try to be impartial. And American money and emotion tend to flow toward the Israelis, not the Palestinians.”
    “You speak as if you’ve been burned yourself.”
    “I’ve seen friends I considered family get crucified in the media.”
    “Friends like Khalil al Aitam?”
    Alexana’s practiced look of nonchalance broke. Her eyebrows settled into a frown. “I don’t approve of the path Khalil has chosen, but I do understand his reasons.”
    “I see.” Ridge seemed pleased to have finally pushed her offcenter.
    Alexana’s mask of control was quickly reestablished. “Maybe you do, maybe you don’t.”
    From his minaret—a tall, thin, tower high above the limestone streets—a muezzin called the Muslims to prayer, as he did five times a day. His haunting wail echoed around them as Ridge and Alexana exited The