Chosen (5 page)

A
lexana waited for Ridge in the back of a black BMW cab, smoothing the fabric of her stunning ivory silk jumpsuit. With its dramatically sleeveless, fitted bodice and stylishly flared pants, the outfit emphasized both her narrow hips and gentle curves, and Alexana felt terrific in it.

Completing the ensemble was an oversize silk shawl of rust, royal blue, and gold, which she had knotted around her shoulders to guard against the chill of the evening.

Briefly she wondered why she had gone all out for Ridge, then quickly decided it was all an act to show him that he couldn’t peg her, as he seemed to do with everyone else.
I’ll surprise him left and right,
she thought coolly. She toyed nervously with her hair, which had been smoothed into a French twist, revealing the tiny dropped pearls at her ears. Glancing out the window, she inhaled sharply in spite of herself as Ridge appeared at the door of his hotel, dressed in a black, tapered tuxedo jacket that flattered both his broad shoulders and lean waist.

Alexana took a deep breath as Ridge approached the car. She could not allow herself to consider it a date, even if he was drop-dead gorgeous and they were going to the most romantic place in town.

Ridge opened the door and leaned in with a broad grin. He looked her up and down, then whistled.

Alexana scowled at him. “Get in, McIntyre,” she said with the humorless tone of a schoolmarm to an errant boy.

“Sor-ry. Just thought I’d give you a compliment,” he said, getting in. His face did not ask for forgiveness. Alexana knew that he felt he had bought some latitude with the hat.
I have to nip this in the bud …

“Are we in grade school?” she asked curtly.

“No-o,” he said, sobering quickly. “I …” His voice trailed away as he looked out the window, searching for words.

“What?”

“Forget it. I’m not very hungry. That pizza didn’t agree with my stomach.”

“What?” she laughed, back-pedaling from her harsh tone. The mood lightened again. “Ridge McIntyre, unable to handle street food?”

A gentle smile eased back into Ridge’s face as the taxi sped off. “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up,” he pretended to grumble. “I’ll start our dinner with some tonic water and be fine.”

At a quarter after six, Ridge and Alexana entered Intercontinental’s elegant, five-star Seven Arches Hotel. Along each wall, huge arrangements of flowers adorned antique tables that had been oiled to a deep shine. Neither Alexana nor Ridge spoke to the other, and Alexana’s heels seemed inordinately loud as they clicked down the marble hallway toward the restaurant.

The maître d’ greeted Alexana by name. “This way, Dr. Roarke. We’re so pleased you and your guest could join us tonight.” His eyes
held thinly veiled curiosity as he looked Ridge over, obviously trying to place the familiar face. Never before had Alexana eaten in his restaurant with someone other than her father and brother.

“Thank you, David. We are pleased to be here.”

He pulled a chair out for her at a window table. “I trust the other Doctors Roarke are well?” he asked as she sat down.

“Very well, thank you for asking,” she answered, taking the offered menu from him.

“Good, good. May I suggest the ossobuco tonight? It looks outstanding. Your waiter will be along shortly to tell you about it in detail.”

“Thank you, David.”

Alexana looked over at Ridge, allowing the tiny smile to return. For some reason she enjoyed surprising the man, and he seemed genuinely awed by the incredible, panoramic, sunset view of the Old City. She squinted as the sunlight hit the golden roof of the Dome of the Rock, its reflection momentarily shining directly into their window.

As she shielded her eyes against the glare, Alexana gave in to the feeling that had nagged at her all afternoon. “Ridge, I have a confession to make.”

“You?” he asked sarcastically, leaning forward.

“Don’t make this tougher than it already is,” Alexana protested, shooting him a warning look. She gazed at him earnestly, the effect heightened by the absence of her glasses. “Look, I’ve had bad experiences with journalists in the past. Poor, inaccurate reports. Misuse of contacts. Misrepresentation.” She sighed. “But I know you have a good reputation, and it hit me this afternoon that I really haven’t
given you a break. It’s not fair, and it is very unchristian of me.”

Ridge had studied her as she spoke. After her confession, he shifted in his chair nervously, then shrugged. “We all have to protect ourselves. I’m used to it.”

Alexana leaned back, wondering. “Do you do that?”

“What?” Ridge asked, pretending not to understand her question.

“Protect yourself.”

Ridge weighed his answer carefully. “To a certain extent.”

“Ahh.” Alexana buried her face in her menu. After several moments of silence, she looked up again. “Tell me, McIntyre. Do you have any weak spots in your protective walls?” she asked.

He blinked slowly and raised one eyebrow. “Isn’t this getting a bit personal?”

“Yes,” she said with a tiny shrug. “Are you as brave as you make yourself out to be?”

He frowned at her, trying to think of a way to change the course of their conversation. “Are you challenging me?”

“In a way,” she said calmly and closed her menu. “Are you the typical reporter, incapable of relating on a personal level?”

Ridge sat back, regarding the woman before him. “I can get personal.” He sounded slightly defensive.

“Good. I don’t care to spend time with people who can’t get beyond a superficial level. Life’s too short.”

“Boy, you lay it on the line, lady, don’t you?”

Alexana smiled with her eyes and nodded.

“You want to know where I am weakest? Did you ever consider being a reporter?”

Her smile grew slightly wider, yet Alexana merely took a sip from
her crystal water glass, giving him time to formulate an answer to her question.

Ridge looked out on the Old City. “Weaknesses … weaknesses. Let me tell you my strengths first. It’ll make me feel a bit more secure when we get to that more distasteful subject.”

“If you must.”

Ridge leaned back, appearing calm. But Alexana noticed that he was unconsciously twisting his napkin into a corkscrew as he spoke. His words should have sounded cocky, but Ridge managed to make it sound as though he was just reporting the facts.

“I did well as a reporter from the get-go, going farther, faster than most of my cohorts. I started at a local station after college, back in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. I was ‘discovered’ and sent to the Boise station. From there I went to CNN as a junior correspondent, where I happened upon a few hot stories and was promoted to international news. Two years later, voilà, here I am in Jerusalem.”

“Professionally, a star. I know that. I want to know what most people don’t know about Ridge McIntyre.”

“Right, my weaknesses. You’re tough, aren’t you?”

A waiter came to take their order, and both absently opted for the special, ossobuco, wanting to get back to their conversation. Their salads arrived shortly thereafter.

“Ah, where were we? Weren’t we talking about my strengths? Did I tell you I had a full-ride football scholarship at Idaho State?”

Alexana smiled, enjoying the banter and Ridge’s unease. “No, I did not know that,” she said idly.

Ridge regarded her determined, calm expression. “I can see that you’re not going to let me charm my way out of this one. Okay. I’ll be frank. Women. Women are a weakness for me.”

“I know that,” Alexana sighed. “That’s too easy, too obvious. Tell me something that no one else knows about Ridge McIntyre,” she repeated.

He looked out to the city, his eyes running over the length of the Temple Mount and the grand mosque on top of it. A thought seemed to come to him. “All right then. My faith,” he said simply. “Here I am in the holiest city in the world, and I don’t know where I stand with God.”

Alexana stopped eating, flabbergasted at his frank confession. She never anticipated that he would actually share something so real, so deep. “Thank you,” she said, setting down her fork. “That took a lot of guts to tell me.” She stared at him in genuine admiration. “So where does that leave you? Are you seeking him?”

“Seeking him? What does that mean anyway?” Ridge asked, lost in thought. “We’re talking about God here. Someone or something so huge, it overwhelms me. I look out at this city,” he said, waving toward Jerusalem, “and I think, men have been looking for God here for years. But being in a place where so many have found him almost puts me off. What if I don’t find him? Does that mean I’m lacking in some way?”

“So you fear the process itself? Or what you’ll find?” she asked gently, no judgment in her voice.

“Both.”

Alexana nodded, swallowing a bite of salad nonchalantly while her heart pounded. There was nothing more exciting for her than watching someone near understanding of his Creator. It was better than anything she’d ever find on an excavation.

Faith was the priceless life goal that had dominated people’s lives in the past. The present. The future. All wrapped up into one. It
made her skin tingle with an awareness that the Spirit was with them.

She reached across the table to lightly take his hand. He looked from the Old City to her. “Ridge, it’s worth the effort. It’s so vital, there’s nothing more important for you. No story will rival the feeling of what you’ll find in Christ. I know it’s scary. I know it takes work. But I can’t emphasize enough how important this is.”

Ridge stared at her, obviously warming to the fact that the subject was bringing him closer to the beautiful archaeologist who had rebuffed him in several ways already.

Alexana sensed this and quietly withdrew her hand. “Don’t confuse this with me,” she said. “This is a relationship between you and God. I’m not part of the bargain. As a Christian, I hope and pray that you’ll find him. For you.”

Ridge sobered, raised one eyebrow, then nodded. “Okay. So how would you suggest I check out this relationship with the Almighty, Dr. Roarke?”

“I have someone you should talk to. We can meet with him tomorrow.”

They filled the rest of their evening with conversation about the Middle East—politics, people, passions. But Alexana could not stop her eyes from holding his own intense gaze, could not ignore the fluttering inside her stomach. The man—usually, so strong, so irritatingly sure of himself—had swiftly cut down her defenses simply by admitting that there was something missing in his life. And that something happened to be her first priority in life: faith. It unnerved her. Was it all a ruse just to get close to her?

A
lexana and Ridge exited the city the next day and walked along a paved road toward the Mount of Olives, ignoring the vendors selling olive wood figureheads of Jesus and the camel drivers who called to them in the hopes of giving the two “tourists” a ride.

“Special deal for you!”

“I take your picture, lady! Special deal today!”

“Shou kran, la,”
Alexana repeated over and over, dismissing them with a polite, but firm, “no thanks” as she led Ridge away.

“I thought you were introducing me to someone,” he said, looking back over his shoulder at Jerusalem as they walked.

“I am.”

He shrugged and followed her lead, stretching his long legs to catch up with her, then shortening his stride to match her own.

It was a cooler day. Alexana and Ridge both wore sweaters: his, a thick, silver blue Norwegian knit that set off his eyes; hers, a long, Irish knit worn over thick ivory leggings.

Alexana gave him a bright smile. “Tell me what you know, so I don’t bore you with basic information. Give me your foundation, and I’ll expand on it.”

“All right. I’ve done my research: Jerusalem has been run by the
Jews since 1967. It’s a land of conflicting religious and political parties that keep it in constant turmoil …”

“How much have you learned about those religious parties?”

“Enough to know that there is religion atop religion—Muslim, Christian, and Jew, among others—and various subgroups within each religion, from the ultraorthodox to the more liberal.

“Then you have the Arabs, who refer to themselves most often as Palestinians,” he continued. “They include both Christians and Muslims, who have been trampled by Jews. After the war of 1967, the Jews suddenly had a homeland. For a people who have never seemed to fit in anywhere and who have been widely persecuted, coming home to the Promised Land must have seemed like a calling from God. In the face of their immigration, the Palestinians have scattered and dispersed, but they remain an angry force here. The Jews, for the most part, have better financial resources and wield more political power. I see a lot of similarities between the Palestinians and our own American Indians.”

“That’s a good start,” she said with admiration. “You won’t be entirely slanted as a journalist to the Zionist cause. As much as my own sympathies lie with the Jews and their desire to see their Promised Land reestablished, I don’t always agree with their methods. It pains me to see what happens to the Palestinians every day.”

“Well, I try not to be biased. That is the goal of the profession, regardless of a reporter’s personal opinions. But my knowledge comes from research, the Internet, and personal interviews. What I still lack is more difficult to describe. I want to know, to see, some of these people firsthand so I can feel what they feel. Like Ghasan.
That
will give me the vision so I can accurately report to the world what transpires here.”

Alexana nodded again, understanding his passion and smiling at the realization that he had caught what many called “Jerusalem fever.” A few minutes later, they reached the Mount of Olives, where she led Ridge down a path and into an ancient olive grove. They hiked up a steep, stony path that ended on a flat rock, shaded by a olive tree. An older man awaited them there, sitting on a small, portable stool with a cane in hand.