But he didn't need one. Actually, he'd never needed one. And yet somehow he'd never managed to convince her of that.

He looked out at the pounding surf, at the ridiculous bikinied beach babes, and saw nothing but Dr. Leo Atkinson from South Village Medical Center frowning at him. Luke was head of the E.R., but Leo was head of surgery. He was also director of all the various department heads. So while technically they were peers, Leo, sitting on the hospital board and also town council, had far more power. Which was fine with Luke, who just wanted to be left alone to heal people, not navigate the bullshit, ass-kissing waters that was hospital politics.

You went too far, Luke, Leo had said. You're a marketing nightmare, and now, unfortunately, something has to be done or you won't be named E.R. Head again in this century.

He was referring, of course, to when Luke had let out a statement regarding the idiocracy of the bureaucrats running their hospital after he'd learned they'd helped fund Healing Waters Clinic, a place where conventional medicine wasn't even practiced.

The comment had been leaked to the press, who'd gleefully reported it in the Los Angeles Times and The South Village Press, among others. The fallout had been immediate. The owner of the clinic had called the hospital board, who'd gone to Leo, who'd gone to Luke.

Fix it. Retract the statement.

Not that easy. To Luke things were black and white. Give him a medical emergency and he could either fix it or not. Mostly he could.

No gray areas, no middle ground.

But Healing Waters Clinic… They worked in that gray area with aromatherapy, massage therapy, acupressure… yoga.

That the board funded such a place when the hospital turned away patients who couldn't pay, patients who legitimately needed their help, was asinine.