The Christmas Stranger. Beth Cornelison

signs of breathing.

      Glancing at Holly, he said, “Watch his chest for me. Tell me if it rises.”

      Nodding, Holly scooted back to give the man room to work as he angled the boy’s head and blew two breaths in the boy’s mouth.

      “Anything?”

      Holly shook her head. “I didn’t see it move.”

      The man frowned. “Something’s obstructing the airway.”

      Quickly he moved to straddle the boy’s legs and stacked his hands on the child’s abdomen. “Come on, sport. Stay with me,” he mumbled as he gave five sharp upward thrusts with his palms. Crawling to the boy’s side, the dark-haired man did a visual check of the boy’s mouth then swept his finger inside. With a deep sigh of relief, he withdrew a piece of hard candy and tossed it aside.

      But the boy didn’t move, didn’t draw a breath.

      Pressing his lips in a taut line, the man glanced up and drilled a hard glare at Holly. His sky-blue eyes were clear and intense. “You, the bride. Help me.”

      Holly blinked, rallying from her fear-based daze. “How?”

      “Give him two full breaths in his mouth, five seconds apart, every time I say now.”

      She nodded her understanding and scrambled closer as the man started chest compressions. Adrenaline spiked her pulse as she watched the man working to save the young boy.

      “Now.” His clear blue eyes met hers, echoing his command.

      Holly bent low and covered the boy’s mouth with hers. Blew. Counted five and blew again.

      “Good. Just like that.” Jerking a nod, he resumed compressions.

      Holly studied the boy now. His lips had regained a bit of their color, but he remained unconscious. She glanced up at his panicked and crying mother. “He’s going to be okay. I promise.”

      Why she was so certain, she couldn’t say. It was risky to assure the mother when she didn’t truly know how this rescue effort would go. But a strange assurance and confidence in the man working on the little boy flowed through her, calming her own frayed nerves.

      Holly moved her gaze to Carol, who held a cell phone to her ear. With a look, Holly asked for an update.

      “An ambulance is on its way. The operator is still on the line,” Carol said softly.

      “Now.”

      Holly met the man’s eyes briefly before dipping her head to give another breath. Count five. Breath.

      As she raised her head from the last puff, the boy coughed, gasped in air.

      “Tommy!” his mother cried and tried to hug him.

      “Give me a minute,” the boy’s rescuer instructed, sidling between the mother and child. Again he checked the boy’s pulse, lifted his eyelids to check his pupils, examined the child’s fingernails. “Tommy, can you hear me? Can you talk?”

      “I want Mommy,” the boy whimpered.

      The man smiled, flashing a set of perfect white teeth as he backed up. “She’s right here, sport.”

      Holly dropped back on her heels, her muscles going limp with relief. She stared at the man who’d saved the boy, mulling the inconsistencies in his appearance. While she knew better than to judge anyone by how they looked, little about this man fit the profile of the average homeless client who came to the Community Aid Center. Though his cheeks and chin were covered in a few days’ growth of beard like many of the other men the center served, his hair was much cleaner, his beard shorter and his skin healthier. In fact, despite needing a shave and a haircut, the square cut of the man’s jaw, sharp angles of the man’s cheeks and straight nose gave him an ironically patrician appearance.

      “Thank you,” she said, laying a hand on his arm. He turned from watching the mother hug her son. “You saved his life.”

      Again his bright blue eyes burrowed deep with their cool intensity, stirring an odd swirling in her belly. “No. We did. Together. Thank you.”

      Holly shook her head. “I didn’t—”

      He wrapped a large hand around hers, and at his touch, the rest of her reply caught in her throat. A warm ripple of sensation skimmed over her. “Yes, you did.”

      She dropped her gaze to his tanned hand and wet her lips. “Really, you’re the one who—” Again her words stalled as she focused on the watch peeking out from under the sleeve of his flannel shirt.

      She knew that watch, hadn’t seen that watch since the last morning Ryan left for work. That watch had been stolen from her husband the day he’d been attacked, murdered in an abandoned church not far from the Community Aid Center.

      Gasping, she jerked a startled frown up to the man as her brother-in-law’s words reverberated in her head.

       Ryan’s killer was most likely a vagrant.

      Matt Rankin knew that look well. Disgust. Accusation. Contempt.

      The exhilaration of having saved the choking boy evaporated under the icy glare from the center volunteer. When he touched her arm, the beautiful blonde bride who’d helped him resuscitate the boy gaped at his hand, her joy and admiration morphing suddenly into something ugly and cold.

      “Where did you get that watch?” she demanded, her tone clipped and accusing. As if he had no right to own something of value.

      And maybe he didn’t. Maybe he should have sold the watch months ago to help pay for food, his rent, his child support. But he couldn’t bring himself to part with the last thing he owned that Jill had given him.

      He tamped down the swirl of emotions that still ravaged him when he thought of Jill’s death and the terrible repercussions that followed. Keeping his tone even, he met the woman’s hard greeneyed stare. “It was a Christmas gift from my wife a few years ago.”

      “Your wife?” She narrowed her eyes skeptically, as if being down on your luck and scrimping to make even a scant income meant you could never have had a wife and children, a home and career. A life to be proud of.

      “Yes, my wife.” Matt sighed. He didn’t have much to be proud of now, and he couldn’t really blame the woman for her snap judgment. In her position, he might think much the same. But the past few months had taught him how close every person was to living on the street.

      His golden life had suffered a chain reaction of tragic blows and shattered.

      An ambulance arrived, and the crowd of spectators cleared a path as the rescue workers huddled around the boy and his mother, checking the child’s vital signs.

      Matt inhaled deeply, and looking back at the blonde woman, he pushed to his feet.

      He dusted his hands off, then extended one to help the bride to her feet.

      She glanced at his proffered hand, hesitated, then let him pull her from the floor.

      “I’m sorry. I just…My husband had a watch like that one stolen, and—”

      “You thought I’d stolen this one.”

      She turned away guiltily. “It just startled me to see it. Your watch is just like Ryan’s and—” She huffed and smoothed a hand over the skirt of her wedding dress costume. “Never mind.” She backed away one step, then forced a tight smile. “Thank you…for helping with Tommy. You saved his life.” Her delicate brow furrowed, and she tipped her head. “How…how did you know what to do?”

      “Anyone can learn CPR and the Heimlich maneuver. They are valuable skills to have.” Yes, he was being evasive, cryptic, not fully forthcoming. But he didn’t feel like explaining the whole sordid story of his ignoble downfall—which he’d inevitably have to. When he mentioned his medical degree, his