Sandstealers

Sandstealers
Ben Brown

Ever wondered what it is like to work in a war zone? ‘We live more in one year than most people do in a lifetime,’ is Danny Lowenstein’s simple retort. Set in a world where life is cheap, vengeance is long and betrayals can be deadly, “Sandstealers” is a masterly thriller – infused with a deep knowledge of modern war and its witnesses.Danny Lowenstein is a big shot war correspondent with the world at his feet. But when an interview goes wrong and he's ambushed on a lonely road in Iraq, questions are asked. Was it a set-up? And was he deliberately sent to his death by one of his own – the tight-knit group of adrenalin-addicted journalists who are supposed to be his best friends? Rachel, Becky, Kaps and Edwin are ‘The Junkies’: together they’ve been through thick and thin and seen the horrors of war. Yet theirs is also a tangled web of intense relationships and dark rivalries. Could one of them have become Danny’s killer?All’s fair in love and war. Including the murder of a friend…

BEN BROWN

Sandstealers

For Geraldine

‘We live more in a year than most people live in a lifetime.’

DANIEL L. LOWENSTEIN, war correspondent

Table of Contents

Part One (#u9604460b-c229-5e7a-84ce-8e035b76ab89)

Chapter 1 (#uf6ccac93-7337-55d9-94eb-d87918cc01ca)

Chapter 2 (#u3303b7d9-f618-5b95-91d5-0a2d61bf5d71)

Chapter 3 (#ua6e0d8f4-56a0-5351-92d5-2eafcf00ab29)

Chapter 4 (#u0aa35273-d4be-594f-9aa6-8d4b042b2b55)

Chapter 5 (#u494ffbc8-b955-56db-8dd0-47476274485b)

Chapter 6 (#u1ca7f495-58ba-55a9-9280-38c60c679b8f)

Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)

Part Two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 21 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 22 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 23 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 24 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 25 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 26 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 27 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 28 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 29 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 30 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 31 (#litres_trial_promo)

Author’s Note (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

PART ONE (#u33ae17c6-68bd-57bd-82fd-9c44103daad7)

1 (#u33ae17c6-68bd-57bd-82fd-9c44103daad7)

Post-Liberation Iraq, August 2004

Danny Lowenstein had a premonition he would die that day. It wasn’t unusual for him to foresee his own death: such thoughts went with the territory. The main thing was not to take them too seriously, otherwise he’d never get out of bed in the morning.

He cursed the sun, which had barely been born into Iraq’s morning sky. Already a sapping heat was rising from the tarmac and soon the temperature would hit a grotesque 50 degrees Celsius. He daren’t translate it into Fahrenheit. As he stood at the petrol station, the road to Iskandariya shimmered ahead of him. Danny wondered if the surface might evaporate before his eyes.

For now he was still fresh. He had sprayed himself with so much deodorant it almost choked him, but his skin felt good beneath the linen shirt he’d bought at Heathrow and his favourite pair of chinos. They were the pseudo-military sort, with extra pockets on the thighs which bulged with a notepad, assorted pens, a small Dictaphone—another terminal purchase—his US passport and press accreditation, some scrunched-up dollar bills and chewing gum for when the day started to drag him under.