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abandoned. He could hardly blame her, when the most he managed was a two-sentence capsule of his day. He knew her well enough to understand that in her mind that could easily be construed as a lack of interest. As Gram had hinted, Moira wasn’t the kind of woman to put up with neglect for long.
    Tonight he managed to keep his eyes open long enough to add a line pleading with her for understanding. “I want to tell you about all of this one of these days, but right now I hardly have two minutes to myself all day long. Hopefully, this will be enough to let you know that I’m thinking about you. Be patient with me. Luke.”
    He’d barely hit the send button and signed off when his cell phone rang. Without even looking at the caller ID, he knew it was Kristen. She’d grown even more impatient with him lately than Moira had. He debated letting the call go to voice mail, but knew it would only buy him one evening of peace. She’d call again tomorrow and the day after that. She might not be the love of his life, but she didn’t deserve to be ignored any more than Moira did.
    “Hey, Kristen,” he said, injecting a note of forced cheer into his voice. “How are you?”
    “Lonely,” she said at once. “What are you doing?”
    “I just got home and I’m about to fall into bed,” he told her.
    “Why not come to my place and fall into my bed?”
    A few months ago, he would have eagerly taken her up on the offer. Right after he’d finished college and was at loose ends, their casual, no-strings understanding was exactly what he’d wanted in his life. Kristen had seemingly been content with it as well. He’d only grown dissatisfied after the trip to Ireland when their few days together after the family had left had felt awkward and vaguely unsatisfying, as if he were doing something wrong, rather than something mutually agreed to. That reaction had been magnified because he’d already sensed that he could have real feelings for someone else, for Moira.
    Once Kristen had left Dublin and he’d stayed on, spending more and more time with Moira, he’d known that he’d have to end things with Kristen as soon as he returned to Chesapeake Shores. So far, though, he’d done nothing about the situation beyond avoiding her when he could. Yet another bit of cowardly behavior that wasn’t fair to anyone.
    “Luke, have you fallen asleep with me on the line?” she asked, a mix of amusement and impatience in her voice.
    “Just about, I’m afraid,” he said. “Not tonight, Kristen. I’m wiped out.”
    “You’ve been wiped out a lot lately.”
    “You know I’ve been totally consumed with turning this pub into a reality. It’s going to be a real crunch to pull it off on time. I’m not going to have a lot of free time for a while.”
    “And then?” she asked pointedly.
    He sighed. “And then we’ll see, I guess. Look, Kristen, we’ve never been exclusive. I can’t ask you to sit around and wait for my schedule to lighten up. That’s not fair to you.”
    “Why do I get the feeling that this brush-off has less to do with your demanding schedule than it does with that woman you met in Ireland, the one everyone but you has mentioned. Moira, is it?”
    He closed his eyes. He should have guessed someone in the family would have filled her in. Because of Kristen’s past history with Mack and her blatant attempt to win him back despite his marriage to Susie, none of the O’Briens approved of Luke’s relationship with her. They’d be all too eager to let her know he’d found someone else and dent what they considered to be her massively self-absorbed ego.
    “It’s not really about Moira or anyone else,” he insisted, trying to cushion this with a half truth. “It’s about my priorities right now. Opening this pub is my first chance to prove myself. I have to stay focused and get this right. There’s no time for distractions.”
    “I suppose I should be flattered that a few hours in my bed would be too great a