Susan Grays (book 1)/ The tale of trust

Chapter 14: The secret meeting

10:30 PM, Low-level Residential area, Minsk, Belarus

Zaytsev parked the car in a corner. Susan looked around. Rows of apartments could be seen on each side of the street. Here and there, groups of people have set fires in big barrels, chattering around. Andrey Novik was a Belarusian smuggler living in one of those flats in that low-level resident of Minsk. Harris had found his address after an hour searching on the dark web.

Susan and Zaytsev walked to the front door of Novik's apartment. When they reached the door, two teenage boys with a basketball in their hand came out of it. 

Susan grabbed the shoulder of one of them. "Гэй, Андрэй Новік жыве тут? (Hey, Andrey Novik lives here?)" She asked in Belarusian. 

The boys looked at her suspiciously. "Я яго не ведаю. (I don't know him.)" Answered one of them and tried to release himself, but Susan kept him in place and pulled a 50 euro note out of her pocket and offered the boys. "Што цяпер? (What now?)" She asked again.

The boys looked at each other and then the one who was grabbed by Susan snatched the money from her hand. "№ 32. (number 32.)" He said. "Але яго цяпер няма дома. Ён проста выйшаў. (But he is not home now. He just went out.)"

"О, такая шкода. (Oh, such a pity.)" Said Susan and then released the boy who soon went away with his friend. 

Zaytsev smirked. "Some old tricks always work." He said. Susan smiled a bit and stuck a tiny camera on the doorframe. "Harris! If you saw Novik, inform us." She said and then stepped into the dirty aisle followed by her companion. "Yes, Ma'am." She heard Harris and inhaled. Hearing him was heartening for her, knowing that he was there and had everything under control.

They stopped in front of an old elevator which could disjoint any moment. "We can use his absence and search his flat for any useful trace. If we didn't' found anything then we will interrogate him. I don't want to make any attention." Said Susan and Zaytsev nodded.

They went to the third floor using the elevator and found the number 32. In a moment when no one was in the semi-dark aisle, Zaytsev opened the door like the lock was nothing and they went in.

The small flat was a mess. The foul smell of Urine, drugs, and cigarettes was in the air. Susan scrunched up her nose disgusted. "Shit!" she said and Zaytsev Smirked while putting on gloves. "Let's finish it soon." He said and began to search. 

"Make sure to leave everything as they were. I don't want him to become suspicious." Said Susan and she began to search after putting on her gloves.

Zaytsev went straight to a small table in front of a Sofa. Food pockets and empty bottles had made a mess on the table and crumbs of chips and cigarette butts had made it's surface almost invisible. But something caught his attention. "Grays!" He called Susan who was busy searching his pockets with a disgusted look. 

Susan walked over to him. He had a tiny piece of paper in his hand. "It must be some kind of code." He said and passed the paper to Susan. 

Susan looked at the strange code in front of her. "It's a meaningless sequence of numbers." She heard Harris's voice. "though we know it has a meaning. It must be obviously some code for he has tried to decode it." She said and pointed to a pencil on the table and then bent down and took a small piece of paper from the ashtray. It was a corner of a paper. 

"he must have written the translation of this paper and then burnt it." Said Zaytsev and Susan nodded. Just then she heard Harris's alarmed voice. "Novik just passed the front door." He said. Susan took off her mobile and captured a photo from the code and then gave it to Zaytsev. "Put it where it was." She said and put the corner of the burnt paper back into the ashtray.