diff --git a/src/mlpack/methods/neighbor_search/neighbor_search_rules_impl.hpp b/src/mlpack/methods/neighbor_search/neighbor_search_rules_impl.hpp
index 1eb29c440db..f4d3712cec7 100644
--- a/src/mlpack/methods/neighbor_search/neighbor_search_rules_impl.hpp
+++ b/src/mlpack/methods/neighbor_search/neighbor_search_rules_impl.hpp
@@ -177,7 +177,7 @@ inline double NeighborSearchRules<SortPolicy, MetricType, TreeType>::Score(
     const double lastRefDescDist =
         traversalInfo.LastReferenceNode()->MinimumBoundDistance();
     adjustedScore = SortPolicy::CombineWorst(score, lastQueryDescDist);
-    adjustedScore = SortPolicy::CombineWorst(score, lastRefDescDist);
+    adjustedScore = SortPolicy::CombineWorst(adjustedScore, lastRefDescDist);
   }
 
   // Assemble an adjusted score.  For nearest neighbor search, this adjusted