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“I don’t know whether to feel seen or insulted,” I admit, breathing in the delicious aroma coming off the huge pizza in front of me. I’m not used to this. Being looked after. “I may be falling apart, but there are still some decisions I’m capable of making for myself.”

“Never doubted it. But sometimes, it helps to have one less decision to make.”

“I’m too tired to argue,” I tell him, secretly mollified.

“You don’t like garlic chicken?”

“Hate it,” I say, lifting a slice to my lips.

The first bite is so good, a wave of emotion washes over me. I feel dramatic until I realize I haven’t sat still long enough to enjoy good food since I got back to Redwood Run almost three weeks ago.

Briggs eats like a man who genuinely respects pizza. Focused. Efficient. No unnecessary conversation while chewing with obvious enjoyment.

It’s oddly attractive.

I decide not to unpack the thought and focus on the food instead.

“I don’t recall this town being so intense,” I venture between mouthfuls.

“No reason why you should,” he observes. You were younger then. Anyway, the level of intensity is dependent.”

“On?”

“How much trouble you’re in.”

I snort softly. “Ben always loved it here.”

Briggs’s expression shifts instantly at Ben’s name. “I know.”

“You all seem…” I search for the right words, “like you were very close.”

“We were. Are. We all miss Ben a lot.”

My chest aches at that. “I’ve noticed.”

Briggs wipes his hands on a napkin before speaking again. “I didn’t really have a family before those idiots came along.”

“Oh?”

He shrugs one broad shoulder. “Foster care. Lotta houses. Lotta people pretending temporary meant the same thing as safe.”

The matter of fact way he says it makes the ache my chest bloom again, for him this time.

“No one kept you long-term?”

A dry laugh leaves him. “Longer when I was little. But then I got older and angrier. A big, angry foster kid isn’t exactly a hot commodity.”

My stomach twists. Briggs doesn’t seem embarrassed by his story, just detached from it in the way people become detached from old injuries that don’t quite heal right.

“Then I met the guys,” he continues. “They became my family.”

“And that was enough?”

A strange softness enters his expression. “First time somebody expected me to stay around.”

The words land directly under my ribs. Because I understand that feeling more than I want to. Not the foster care part. The distance part. The always halfway packed to leave part.

I look down at the remains of my pizza. “I’ve spent most of my adult life making sure nobody needs me too much, except with my job.”