Page 39 of The Score We Never Settled

“He has a home here.”

“And he doesn’t talk to his father like he should.”

Mhm, I don’t know if I necessarily agree to that.

There is a lot of hurt in that relationship, and I wouldn’t even know where to navigate that. Briggs not only had an emptiness when his mother died, but his father abandoned him, too.

It was like he lost both of them, but one was still here, and I think that might hurt worse.

“You already know the story behind Mr. Kerrigan and Briggs. It’s cruel.”

“It’s old.”

My neck snaps to my uncle because, now, that was cruel and unnecessary, regardless of his personal opinions about Briggs.

“Are you serious? Can you imagine someone doin’ that to me after Mom and Dad died? That’s heartless and?—”

“Frank struggled,” my uncle tries to defend. “Raisin’ three kids?—”

“And neglectin’ one of them,” I clip out, and I don’t regret that I do. My uncle is very old school and set in his ways, but he knows better than to try to side with Frank Kerrigan on the matter. There is no other way to paint it. “That’s not an excuse. Briggs saved his home and his sisters when Mr. Kerrigan got that second mortgage with a balloon payment on it. If it weren’t for him, who knows what would’ve happened to them.”

My uncle shifts his weight, clearly uncomfortable with having to admit that Briggs does have some empathy and compassion in him.

Not just turmoil and anger in his veins.

“That boy may have rescued his family home and kept them from becoming homeless, but the town would have helped. Furthermore, that boy has always had a knack for bothering you?—”

“He never bothered me, Uncle Ben. You were just worried that he’d break my heart and I’d crumble into a million pieces like some weak little girl without a backbone.”

He frowns. “I never said that.”

But you thought it.

And I did.

However, I do have one hell of a backbone, and I chose to be with Briggs.

I chose, and then I chose not to.

“Is that all you came here to tell me?” I press because, honestly, it’s too late and annoying. “Because we have a dinner date tonight, and I know you ain’t wearingthat.”

I’m using dinner date loosely here because it’s the town’s summer festival. And, every time they serve the fish and chips, my Uncle Ben loses his damn mind.

And when I say he loses his damn mind, I mean it’s his favorite.

Uncle Ben promptly looks down at his attire. “What’s wrong with it?”

“Miss Agnes doesn’t like gaudy belt buckles. She likes ones that are present but don’t take up your whole waistline.”

He narrows his eyes at me. “Andwhywould I be concerned about Miss Agnes andanythingshe’d like?”

“Because you’ve been wantin’ to ask her on a date now for months and?—”

“I havenot.”

My brows lift because, yes, he has. And if he’d stop talking to his card friends about it, I wouldn’t know about it.

Furthermore, he needs to date so he’ll leave me and my love life out of his brain.