Page 57 of Cuckoo

It was a Latin dance class, the teacher a sleazy bloke called Javier with greased black hair and a blinding white smile that made simps like my mother weak at the knees. She had nattered non-stop on the journey to this random hall, reapplying her lipstick before going inside. My performance was abysmal. I’d no coordination, no sense of rhythm. I flailed around pathetically, trying desperately to keep up with everyone else, to keep Mother happy, not to spoil the big day she had imagined when she’d booked the class and bought us matching shoes.

Javier tried to come over and help me but I saw Mother frown and so I quickly batted him away, assuring him I wanted to get there on my own. Mother told him she could do with extra help instead. As he held her hands from behind and showed her how to roll her hips, I ploughed on, determined not to disappoint her.

‘You’re rather clumsy, Claire, darling,’ she said to me in a low voice, brows furrowed in reproach.

I sashayed away from her, desperate to find some hidden talent in myself that would make her proud. But minutes later my heels began to burn, and soon my feet were all I could focus on, the steps that Javier was trying to teach us going right over my head as I was distracted by the dull ache from my squeezed-together toes, the searing burn in the back of my heels with every step I took.

Eventually, I couldn’t take it anymore. I paused, wincing as I peeled off the shoes. Ribbons of skin hung limply from my blistered heels. The insides of my shoes were covered in blood. I could feel Mother’s glare from across the room as I dared to pad over to her barefoot, my high heels abandoned at the side of the hall. I couldn’t bear to put them back on and my lacerated feet were stinging at the kiss of the cold air. My face heated at the realisation that I had left bloody patches on the floor where I had removed the shoes.

I smiled at her, tried to continue as we had been before, but she tilted her face away and ignored me for the rest of the lesson. When we were back in the car, she let rip.

‘You hate the beautiful shoes I’ve bought you! I paid for this dance class for us but you ignored me the whole time and left blood all over the place… Just imagine what Javier must have thought. The absolute state of you! That’s the last time I treat you to anything nice. You are so ungrateful. You’re spoilt. Spoilt rotten.’

The words stung at first. But their impact faded as I realised the sting in my heels was even worse.

Chapter Fifty

Madeline Choi

As soon as Dodgson introduces the next witness, I feel sick. My throat is tacky and dry and I begin to tremble in anticipation. It was one thing seeing Lilah with Noah at the club, learning about her and assessing her on social media. It’s an entirely different matter to have to face in court, when I am on trial for murder, yet another woman Noah has supposedly been seeing. I still cling on to the hope that this is a mistake, a misunderstanding. Mads is also a male name after all; there could be a reasonable explanation for those evening meetings.

But even if there isn’t, meaning that my defence becomes easier, that I’ll receive a lesser sentence, it still means I’ve been deceived twice over by Noah. Before I heard about Mads, I hadn’t even contemplated the possibility that there were more women in his life, other girlfriends. For a start, who has the time? But then I chew on my lip as I think of all the work trips he had to take, all the late nights in the office that I thought were part and parcel of being a high-flying financial whizz-kid, but which perhaps concealed something darker.

‘Dodgson is pissed off about this one,’ Grosvenor whispers to me, leaning over.

‘Why?’ I whisper back.

‘She’s only going to hurt his case. It’s brilliant for us, though,’ she tells me.

‘So why is he questioning her?’ I ask.

‘He’ll look stupid if he doesn’t. When I requested she should appear as a witness, he was given the choice to cross-examine. If he doesn’t bother then it’s an automatic one–nil to us. I guess he’s just going to try to pull whatever he can out of her to help his cause, but let’s be honest, she’s only going to make Noah look terrible,’ Grosvenor explains.

I don’t reply.

‘And you look innocent,’ she adds, as though this wasn’t clear to me.

The sound of shuffling and bodies turning in their seats announces that the new witness has arrived. The whole room is looking in the same direction. I see a flash of white-blonde hair and quickly glance away, my face hot. Is she a relative of Lilah? Or just another blonde woman? As Mads steps into my peripheral vision I jolt out of my spiral of inner turmoil. I find myself fascinated by her looks; so different from Lilah yet so similar in her air of confidence; the expensive perfume that wafts from her as she walks past me to the witness stand. She is petite, around five foot two, and while Maggie was right to assume from her surname she would be Korean, I think Mads may be mixed-race. Her raven hair is pinned back with pearl clips and she’s wearing a pink lip gloss that shines, making her mouth look as lovely as Lilah’s, though her lipsare less bowed. And she’s pale– as pale as Grosvenor, another way in which she is more similar to me than to Lilah. This woman seems less supermodel, more everyday, and the realisation terrifies me because it means that Noah just wanted women– any woman– to satisfy him. If Lilah and I combined weren’t enough, how many more was he seeing? I grip the table tightly until the flesh under my nails turns white and I wonder if I will throw up.

‘Miss Choi, will you please explain to the jury how you came to meet Mr Coors?’ Dodgson asks.

Mads clears her throat, looking directly at the jury and avoiding my eyes. ‘I work at the Squat Rack gym. I’m a personal trainer there and Noah signed up using his company discount. I gave him a free session, which I give every new customer to the gym, and he asked for my number. We began a… correspondence,’ she says. I wince at her word choice.

‘Was this professional or personal?’

‘It began as professional; I was just his trainer. It became romantic.’

‘Did you want it to become romantic?’ Dodgson asks, raising an eyebrow.

Mads looks indignant. ‘I’m a grown woman. If I didn’t want it to become romantic, it wouldn’t have.’

‘And are you in the habit of dating clients?’ he asks.

At this, her cheeks flush pink. ‘No, I am not. Noah was and still is the only client I have ever become romantically involved with.’

‘Do you date a lot?’ Dodgson asks.

‘Objection! Relevance,’ Grosvenor intervenes.

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