Debt Bomb

By Michael Ginsberg

"A deftly crafted thriller that kept me turning pages---through politics, money, and murder---to the ending I didn't see coming." - Chris DeRose, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Fighting Bunch.

A political thriller, tied in to real events, about an apocalyptic threat to America that is ticking remorselessly in the background while Americans continue their daily routines, oblivious to the danger.

For years, China's spy agency has been watching the United States rack up trillions of dollars in debt, waiting for the right moment to weaponize that debt to collapse the American government and install a Communist puppet regime.

At the same time, suburban accountant Andrea Gartner has been an outspoken critic of the debt as a leader in the South Carolina state Republican Party.

When the United States elects President Earl Murray, he brings Andrea into his government as budget director to solve America's debt problem. But before the nameplate is even installed on her office door, China strikes, engineering an American debt crisis that brings the country to the brink of collapse. Government operations come to a screeching halt. With the American hegemon on its knees, China violently seizes the opportunity to fulfill its territorial ambitions in Taiwan and the South China Sea.

Thrust into the rapacious, cutthroat world of American politics and surrounded by crises on all sides, Andrea begins a desperate effort to save the United States. Arrayed against her are cynical politicians and belligerent military brass, some of whom just might be secret Chinese agents.

Will Andrea be able to keep the United States alive to fight another day? Or will America drown in a sea of red ink at the hands of the Chinese and see its democratic government replaced by a Chinese Communist puppet regime?

American life as we know it is about to be obliterated by a debt bomb. And the only person who can save the country is a suburban accountant.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BQB Publishing
• Release date: Jul 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781952782091

Book preview

After nearly two decades as an accountant, Andrea Gartner had fatally wielded ledger books more times than she cared to remember. She was well acquainted with watching entire lives unravel before her, tears streaming down the faces of grown men annihilated by simple balance sheets charting their financial ruin in ink redder than blood.

Today, she found herself in that painfully familiar spot once more.

She fixed her eyes on the man sitting opposite her, Cam Davis, owner of the largest chain of furniture stores in Columbia, South Carolina. She was the only thing standing between him and the end of his financial life as he knew it. His devil-may-care attitude—the source of so much of his business success—had now left him teetering on the precipice of bankruptcy.

You have an existential debt problem, said Andrea.

Telling the cocksure, self-styled Mattress King of South Carolina he was flirting with financial ruin was terrifying, but what Andrea truly feared was him ignoring her dire warnings. She prayed she wasn’t about to watch another client whistle past the graveyard of fiscal reality.

"A what problem? asked Cam incredulously. Come on. I sold more furniture last year than my next two competitors combined."

I’ve been through your books, she replied. Your finances are a house of cards. You’re a hair’s breadth from complete bankruptcy.

Cam didn’t act like someone about to go broke. Everyone in Columbia knew he was one of the most generous people in the city. Every Christmas, he donated hundreds of mattresses to homeless shelters. When his alma mater, the University of South Carolina, made the playoffs in any sport, he’d give away free sofas to the first fifty customers in his stores the next day. He sponsored Little League teams and 5K races for charity. His heart was big. His wallet was even bigger and seemingly always open.

She glanced out the window. The Mattress King’s red Ferrari with MTRSKNG vanity license plates was parked next to her battered ten-year-old Toyota Camry. His thousand-dollar sports coat and Rolex contrasted sharply with the peeling wallpaper and army surplus furniture of her office. Even his cologne smelled expensive.

You can’t be serious, said Cam. I’ve got twenty stores in Columbia. And twenty more across the rest of the state. If I need cash, I’ll borrow it. No bank is going to turn down a loan application from the Mattress King.

Here we go again, she thought. He’s not getting it, and I’m not getting through to him.

Andrea turned her computer screen so Cam could see his balance sheet for himself. Your Highness, you have maxed-out credit facilities with the two largest banks in Columbia. She dragged her finger line by line through his balance sheet. You have a five-million-dollar loan with the largest bank in Columbia and you’re six months behind on payments. You’re also behind on lease payments for your three largest stores. Personally, you’re carrying five-digit balances on four separate credit cards.

Cam waved his hand dismissively, the gold bracelet on his wrist jangling against his Rolex. I have the highest-grossing furniture stores in Columbia. I’m getting ready to build more throughout the state. If I don’t have the money now, it’ll come. I’ll be fine. Stop worrying, will you?

Andrea pursed her lips. Cam, we’ve been working together for years, she said earnestly. You were one of my first clients, and you’re still one of my favorites. I’ve bought four mattresses since moving to Columbia, all from Cam’s Discount Furniture. So I’m going to give it to you straight.

Give me what straight?

I hate debt, and you are neck-deep in it. You’ve got the Sword of Damocles hanging over your head. An unexploded grenade in your hand waiting to have its pin pulled. Pick your metaphor. And someone else is in control of dropping the sword or pulling the pin.

Cam laughed. Aren’t you being a little dramatic?

If someone out there wanted to destroy Cam’s Discount Furniture, said Andrea, all they’d need to do was stop loaning you money and call in your loans. Your stores would be liquidated and out of business in a week.

I sold twenty million dollars of furniture last year. There has to be cash somewhere.

Andrea shook her head and ran her hands through her hair in frustration, mussing the extra curl and bounce she’d given it by blowing it dry a little longer this morning. The minute the money comes in I have to allocate it to paying interest on one of your loans. The money goes out faster than it comes in. This isn’t about your revenues. It’s about your spending.

Andrea suspected no one had ever talked to him like this before.

What are you saying? Cam’s air of confidence was beginning to fade.

You need to sell some stores. Or close some.

Close stores? asked Cam, wide-eyed.

Andrea nodded. Take the proceeds and pay down some of your debt. Sell your mansion. Sell the Ferrari. Take the kids out of private school. Clean your slate. I’m telling you, if you don’t do this now, in six months, the banks will do it for you. It’ll be a lot less painful and humiliating if you do it on your own terms.

Forget it, Cam scoffed. We’ll figure something else out. I built this business from the ground up. It’s my life’s work. And my kids’ inheritance. I’m not selling any of it. Things can’t possibly be as bad as you’re saying.

You said it yourself: you outsold the other two furniture stores in Columbia combined, she said. There isn’t more room to grow. Not enough to pay back your creditors. If you don’t sell some of your stores, they’ll all get foreclosed, and you’ll have to declare bankruptcy. Do what I’m telling you and you can still save some of your business.

I’ll get another loan. Cam leaned forward and placed his hand on Andrea’s desk. His face reddened as he dug in against her advice. I’m not selling any of my business, you hear me?

No one is going to loan you more money, Andrea said quietly. She put her hand on top of his and could feel the tension in his fingers. You have to sell some of the business. It’s the only way to save at least some of your stores. Your only other option is to declare bankruptcy.

Cam forcefully yanked his hand free. I started with nothing!

He stood up from the chair and paced the room, his hands gesticulating wildly. Seeing Cam’s tall, muscular frame angrily march around the room exacerbated Andrea’s inferiority complex. She was five foot five and ten pounds overweight.

Everything you see—my stores, my Ferrari, my mansion, my kids’ private school—I earned it, Cam seethed. I’m not giving it up just because things are a little overextended. We’ll find the cash some other way. How could you ask my family to give all this up?

If only he knew, Andrea thought. She glanced at the picture of her family on her desk. Six months after that family portrait was taken, her father was diagnosed with prostate cancer. A year later he was dead. He’d left them a financial mess and medical bills they couldn’t pay. Andrea was fifteen at the time. Her mother had sold their house and pulled Andrea and her brother out of their private school. Alone and adrift in a public school, unable to break into the existing high school cliques, Andrea would spend hours sobbing in the girls’ locker room. Her college dreams were dashed because there were no funds to pay for it, so she resorted to working multiple jobs while her friends partied every weekend.

Andrea had never forgotten the searing experience of losing everything she’d known. That was why she became an accountant, to help other families the way she wished someone had helped her.

Cam put a cigarette in his mouth and fumbled with his lighter.

I thought you quit, Andrea said.

I have. He lit the cigarette and took a deep drag, then puffed a cloud of smoke into the air. But I keep some around for emergencies.

Andrea had never seen Cam react this emotionally. He was one of the most self-assured businesspeople she knew. If he considered this an emergency, maybe she was getting through to him.

You earned it. That much is true, she said. But you didn’t just earn revenue for your business. You also earned the opportunity to borrow money against your success and the trust of lenders that you’d pay back what you borrowed. You took advantage of that trust. I’m telling you, as your accountant, you can’t pay it back. As soon as your lenders realize it, they’ll collapse your entire empire.

Cam sat back down in a huff, taking deep drags of his cigarette. Sweat glistened on his forehead.

Don’t beat yourself up about this, said Andrea, trying to comfort him. You think you’re the only person who’s fallen into this trap? You’re not. It’s a common story. Every accountant has experienced some version of it. An entrepreneur starts small, hand-to-mouth, and hits it big.

It’s the American Dream! exclaimed Cam. Cigarette ash fell to the floor when he threw his hands up for emphasis.

Right, but then suddenly everyone wants to lend him money to grow his business and expand his lifestyle. More stores for the company. Fast cars, yachts, and beachfront condos for the owner. The business grows, but the debt grows faster. Before long, a company with a great product and business model is drowning in debt and goes under. Toys R Us sold eleven billion dollars’ worth of toys a year. Eleven billion dollars! And they still collapsed under a mountain of debt.

Cam glowered at Andrea with gritted teeth, still fuming.

I know how easy it is to get addicted to debt, she continued. You think you’re the only one? Look at the federal government. America has forty trillion dollars of debt. The average person has no idea how much we’re borrowing every day just to keep the government running. Your debt is peanuts compared to that. What’s happening to you will happen to the country if we don’t do something soon. If America’s lenders demand repayment, we’re hosed. The thought scares the bejesus out of me.

For goodness’ sakes, Andrea, every time I come in here you bring up the national debt, said Cam. Blah, blah, blah, the national debt monster is going to come and bite us all. You’ve been saying that for years, and has the debt monster bitten us? Even once?

Not yet, but it’s coming, said Andrea. Trust me. It’s coming.

When? Next century? Cam threw his hands in the air. You’ve been saying that since we started working together. That was in 2008! It’s now 2027, and nothing has changed! All you do is warn about the debt boogeyman, but nothing bad has happened. While you’re busy predicting doom and gloom, the stock market is hitting the stratosphere and the economy is going gangbusters. Now you’re warning me the same debt monster is going to eat my business. Why should I believe a word you say? Your Chicken Little act is getting old. You’re all talk, no action.

Andrea clenched her jaw. Who the hell was Cam Davis to tell her she was all talk and no action?

That’s not true, she protested. I spent four years as the chairman of the Richland County Republican Party. And then I was Third Vice Chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party. I’ve supported Debt Rebel candidates promising to reduce the national debt for as long as the Debt Rebellion movement has been around. And the only reason I got involved in Republican politics in the first place was because I was worried about the debt! I’ve seen debt destroy peoples’ lives. I don’t want it to destroy the country too.

Please, Cam said dismissively. I’m a businessman. I know the difference between talk and action. You debt scolds are all talk. Has the national debt gotten one dollar smaller since fearmongers like you started screaming about it?

I’ve spent years researching what it would take to run for Congress and deal with the debt myself, she blurted before she could stop herself. And I’ve cultivated relationships across the state to make it happen. Is that action enough for you?

She folded her arms across her chest and stiffened her back. Surely this would impress Cam as bold action. But even as the words were leaving her mouth, she knew she was getting far out in front of her skis. All she had ever done was idly muse about running for office with her husband, Ryan. Now here she was, practically declaring her candidacy with a client.

Seriously? Cam’s voice dripped with disbelief.

I’m dead serious, said Andrea, too dug into the argument to walk back her confident declaration.

I know your personality. The corner of Cam’s mouth curled into a smirk. You’re an accountant, not a politician. Politics would eat you alive.

Andrea threw her head back in exasperation. Everyone tells me the same thing! ‘You’re too nice.’ ‘You’re too honest.’ Even my husband says politics is too tough a business for a quiet homebody like me. First you tell me I should take action, and then when I propose action, you say I’ll suck at it.

If it will get you off my back, then go ahead and run for Congress, said Cam.

I will, Andrea shot back. And maybe I’ll win.

Go ahead, said Cam. Scare other people for a change. Let the rest of America enjoy your national debt neurosis.

Fine, I’m running, said Andrea. You satisfied?

They stared at one another across the desk.

She sat stunned and angry with herself. How could she have let him goad her into running for Congress? She tightly folded her arms across her chest again, feigning confidence in her abrupt decision.

Cam finally spoke. I’m glad you’re finally doing something about the national debt instead of nagging me every time I come in here. Tell you what, I’ll make the first donation to your campaign.

Don’t you be making any donations, said Andrea. Use that money to pay down your debts. If you don’t sell some stores, cut back your lifestyle, and pay down your debts, you’ll lose everything.

Not a chance, said Cam. He emphatically extinguished his cigarette in the ashtray on Andrea’s desk. I’ve made it this far. I’ll figure out something.

He got up from his seat and walked to the office door.

Cam, this is it, she warned. If you leave now without doing anything I’ve suggested, your entire furniture empire is as good as gone.

Cam hesitated, his hand gripping the doorknob.

Is it going to happen again? Is yet another client going to ignore my advice and run headlong into financial ruin?

Cam turned and smiled, his confidence back. Don’t worry, the banks and lenders love me, he said with a cocky grin. I’ll work something out with them. I always have.

Then he opened the door and walked out. The office windows rattled as the door slammed shut behind him.

Andrea laid her forehead on her desk.

Why can’t I persuade clients to fix their bottom lines and clean up their debts?

It wasn’t as if she hadn’t prepared to make the case to Cam. She’d even practiced making her arguments just before he had arrived. Fat lot of good it had done. By the end of their conversation, he was as unconcerned about his finances as ever, and she had backed herself into running for Congress.

If I can’t convince a man on the cusp of bankruptcy to take my advice, how am I going to convince anyone to vote for me so that I can fix America’s finances?

She stood up and looked at her reflection in the full-length mirror on the wall beside her desk. Her plain, professional pantsuit and unremarkable shoes practically screamed to the world she was the typical unassuming accountant. Two kids, a modest suburban rancher, and the ubiquitous sensible family sedan or minivan in the driveway. Accountants like her weren’t meant to play in the big leagues, and Cam’s dismissive attitude confirmed every bit of the inferiority she felt.

But the terror of America’s looming debt crisis had been building inside Andrea like the pressure between tectonic plates on a fault line. Cam’s insults had just jarred the plates loose and unleashed an earthquake within her. Most people were completely unaware of how many lives crumble before the nondescript personalities who work within the antiseptic office walls of an office like hers. They could never conceive of a taciturn, bespectacled accountant morphing into death, the destroyer of worlds.

Her piercing ice-blue eyes, the ones her husband Ryan said reminded him of Steely Dan’s Josie, the Roman with her eyes on fire, stared back at her in the mirror. Ryan always said her eyes were the clue that there was much more buried within this humble accountant.

But all she saw in her eyes was failure. Failure to persuade her clients to follow her advice. Failure to get anyone to take her concerns about the national debt seriously. She’d seen Cam’s fate on this day. In his impending doom, she also saw the fate of a country.

Acorn shot out of bed at six a.m. to the buzzing of the same alarm clock he’d been using since high school. He hated crowds, and by eight a.m. the Metro subway train he took downtown to his Capitol Hill office would be a sardine can as riders jockeyed for space to grip the handholds.

Even though he lived only ten Metro stops from his office, he hated the commute. Trains had a fifty percent chance of having broken air conditioning, a disaster during the hot summer months. He had to go down three levels of escalators to get to the train platform. And he had to pay five dollars one way for the privilege.

Acorn dressed in his customary suit, draped the lanyard with his Capitol access badge around his neck, and smiled at himself in the mirror. At forty-four years old, he sat at the pinnacle of staff power in Washington as the chief of staff to Congressman Lewis Mason, the chairman of the House Debt Rebel Gang, and damn did he look the part. The badge gave him a feeling of importance and superiority. Other people lived by the rules; he made them.

His self-satisfaction was well-placed. He’d begun his Washington career fresh out of college as a lowly staffer in a conservative think tank. But he had no patience for climbing the greasy pole slowly. He was on a mission. Within two years he had set up his own think tank dedicated to balancing the budget and cutting the national debt. He stormed cable news and built himself into one of the go-to talking heads in Washington on the budget and the debt. Lewis Mason had taken notice and hired him to be his chief of staff at the tender age of thirty-six. His political rise had been meteoric even by Washington standards.

On the way to the Metro station, Acorn made his usual stop at the small Tivoli Gourmet shop outside the station for chocolate chip scones. The thought of digging into a scone always lightened the burden of his unpleasant commute. He approached the pastry counter and said, The usual.

And what is that? the counterman asked.

Huh? Acorn took his eyes off the case of pastries and peered at the man. It wasn’t PJ, the proprietor of the Tivoli Gourmet whom he’d known for the twenty-two years he’d been living and working in Washington. Today’s counterman appeared to be Chinese, probably in his early twenties. Acorn had never seen him before.

Greetings, my friend, I’m Frank Palmer, Acorn said, using his real name. You new here?

Yes, I’m a student at Marymount down the street, the counterman said in perfect English without a hint of an accent. I’ve started working here mornings. Today is my first day.

Good to meet you, said Acorn, but his antenna went up. PJ had never mentioned about hiring new help. The only other time PJ wasn’t there was when he was at the hospital with his daughter after the birth of his first grandchild.

Where’s PJ? asked Acorn.

Meeting with a supplier. Can I help you?

Meeting a supplier? That was not like PJ. He’d been in business for twenty years. Suppliers came to him.

Two chocolate chip scones, please.

We don’t have any today.

Two chocolate chip muffins, then.

We don’t have any of those either.

I’ve been coming here every weekday for ten years, and there’s never been a day you didn’t have chocolate chip scones or muffins. First PJ’s gone, and now this.

Can I get you something else?

How about a cheese Danish.

May I suggest the red velvet cupcake?

I don’t do cupcakes for breakfast.

This cupcake is more like a muffin and less like a dessert, the man said.

I think I’d prefer the cheese Danish. Do you have any?

I think you’ll like the red velvet cupcake, the man insisted. I strongly suggest you try it.

Acorn had pressed hard enough. He knew what the counterman’s insistence meant.

Crap. Over the years, Acorn had half-convinced himself that his minders had forgotten about him. Every day that passed, he became more convinced he would make it to a ripe old age safe and sound.

I’ll take the cupcake, said Acorn.

I know you’ll like it. The man carefully picked the cupcake in the left column and third row of the display tray and handed it to Acorn.

Acorn paid for the cupcake and left the store. He sat down at a nearby bus shelter and glanced around to see if anyone was nearby. Seeing no one, he unwrapped the cupcake from its paper.

The paper was blank.

He took a bite of the cupcake. The man was right. It wasn’t bad.

He took a second bite.

Ouch! His front teeth had bitten something hard.

It was a small coin with a Chinese character on it.

Acorn stared at it. Exactly as he feared. He was now an active agent.

He crumbled the cupcake to check if it contained any other signals but found nothing. Only crumbs. He brushed them to the ground and the flock of pigeons camped around the Ballston Metro stop ravenously descended on them.

Acorn glanced about. No one seemed to be paying him any attention.

Twenty-two years he’d been living and working in DC with nary a peep from his minders. Now, with no warning, his minders had activated him.

Why?

The why would have to come later. For now, he needed to be on alert for his instructions.

He furtively made his way to the subway entrance, discreetly scanning everyone he passed as he’d been trained. He reflexively hunched his shoulders, hoping it would make him less conspicuous. He spotted the man who distributed copies of the Express mini-newspaper to Metro riders at the station entrance.

Morning, said Acorn.

Morning, the man replied. Usually, he gave Acorn the copy on top of the pile, but today he fumbled through his stack as though looking for a specific copy. He finally pulled one from near the bottom of the stack.

Here you go. He handed Acorn the paper. Have a great day.

Thanks, said Acorn. See you tomorrow.

As always.

As he turned to leave, the man slipped something heavy into Acorn’s pocket. Acorn slid his hand into his pocket as he headed down the station escalator and felt the mysterious gift. When he pulled it out, he saw it was a TAG Heuer wristwatch. He quietly slipped it onto his left wrist.

Acorn sat on one of the benches on the platform. Usually he’d turn to page two of the Express to read about the hearings happening on the Hill, but now he turned to the sports page. It featured a picture of Washington football players heading into their team headquarters, the Temple, in Ashburn, Virginia. The caption read: Washington players prepare to enter the Temple. Someone had highlighted prepare to enter the Temple.

There it was: prepare to enter the Temple. Exactly what Acorn didn’t want to see. But he was devoted to the Cause, had handed his life to the Cause, and he was going to see it through.

He wrestled an American Express credit card from his wallet where it was tucked into its own pocket behind his driver’s license. The card had seen the light of day only three times in the twenty-two years since Acorn became an agent. The first time was when he put it in the wallet, and the second time was when he transferred it from an old wallet to a new wallet. Today was the third time.

The front of the card appeared to be a typical American Express card, but the back didn’t have the usual magnetic stripe. Instead, there was a list of stock phrases his minders used as instructions listed in two columns, the code on the left and the translation on the right. Next to prepare it read await instructions. Next to enter the temple, it read cave.

Acorn slipped the card back into his wallet. He understood the message.

The train to Capitol Hill arrived, and he took a seat feeling a torrent of conflicting emotions. His pulse quickened in anticipation of his coming mission, but paranoia had also set in. He scanned every face, wondering if they were friend or foe.

Memories of his parents overtook him, and conversations he hadn’t thought about since his childhood emerged from the recesses of his mind. His parents had prepared him for this moment. They’d been gone for a decade now, having failed to fulfill their dreams of bringing capitalism to its knees. His mother and father had gone to work for China after the fall of the Berlin Wall, though Acorn was convinced they’d never emotionally recovered from the Soviet Union’s collapse.

His parents were Harvard physicists, but they’d never quite made it in the scientific world. Despite their talents, their struggle to win research grants left them serving only as post-doctorate research fellows in an academic laboratory, at the mercy of their boss’s willingness to obtain grants to keep them employed. They were consumed by bitterness at the system that hadn’t rewarded them and barely recognized their years of toil and sacrifice.

Over the years, their bitterness turned to hatred. Their hatred wasn’t merely ideological; it coursed through their veins. Capitalism had left them nearly broke, living in a ramshackle house on the outskirts of Cambridge while their classmates had gone to Wall Street and made millions doing nothing but moving money around. The velocity of money, they’d called it. Meetings, phone calls, balance sheets. Five-star business lunches. What the hell are they actually doing? his father would say. His father and mother were the ones inventing things and making things while the students who partied into the wee hours and happily coasted on gentlemen’s Cs in college were considered Masters of the Universe. Under Communism, the roles would be reversed. There would be no Wall Street money boys to swoop in and reap the profits from the scientists and engineers who created the value.

It wasn’t until Acorn was a Harvard undergrad studying chemistry that he understood his parents’ vision. In his senior year, a colleague at the Harvard Independent, a campus weekly, bragged about his