Chapter 10 - PRESTON NEEDED ELENA TO LOOK DIFFICULT BEFORE SHE EVER WENT INTO LABOR
The major twist came from Khloe.
Not because she suddenly became heroic.
Because her own attorney advised cooperation.
Khloe admitted that Preston had instructed her to maintain an informal file on Elena’s “decision instability.”
Elena stared across the conference table during the mediated interview.
“What does that mean?”
Khloe looked exhausted.
“Screenshots. Messages. Times you changed questions.”
“I changed questions?”
“Preston said if anything went wrong, the record needed to show you were repeatedly counseled and difficult to satisfy.”
Elena felt sick.
Laura leaned forward.
“When did he say this?”
“Before the growth scan.”
Weeks before labor.
Before the canceled C-section.
Before the privacy complaint became serious.
Khloe continued.
Preston knew the quality program had a problem.
Several cases in his low-cesarean cohort had been reviewed after complications. In at least two, auditors questioned whether risk factors should have excluded the patients from the “low-risk” group.
No finding of widespread malpractice had been made.
But the project was under scrutiny.
Then Elena became pregnant.
Preston made a reckless choice.
He began talking about his own wife as proof that physicians should not default to cesarean simply because a baby appeared large.
At meetings.
At dinners.
Informally.
He turned Elena into a symbol before she chose anything.
When her clinical plan moved toward scheduled surgery, Preston’s professional story became embarrassing.
Then Elena filed the privacy complaint.
Now a review of who accessed her chart could expose how involved he had become.
So Preston created a second story.
Elena was jealous of Khloe.
Elena was anxious.
Elena changed her mind.
Elena was hostile to medical staff.
Elena demanded surgery, then questioned it, then demanded it again.
If anyone later investigated the delivery-plan changes, Preston could argue he was managing a uniquely difficult spouse-patient boundary.
Three earlier clues changed at once.
The canceled C-section note was not merely Preston trying to get the birth outcome he wanted.
It created documentation that Elena herself had supposedly reversed course.
The delayed growth scan gave his preferred labor plan more time while reducing the chance of additional measurements strengthening Elena’s desire for surgery.
And his fixation on Khloe was deliberate misdirection.
If Elena’s complaints could be framed as jealousy toward a young female doctor, the institutional questions looked personal.
Elena asked Khloe:
“Why did you help him?”
Khloe cried.
“I wanted the fellowship.”
“That’s it?”
“No.”
She wiped her face.
“I thought he was right about you.”
Elena went still.
Khloe continued.
“He told me you were controlling. That you hated any woman he mentored. That you would come after me if I challenged him.”
Elena almost laughed.
May you like
Preston had told each woman the other was dangerous.
Then positioned himself as the person both needed.
