Page 1 of Wolf.e

THE ART OF A PRESIDENT’S WAR

In two generations, you will be completely forgotten.

The illusion that you won’t be keeps you going.

The illusion that somehow you are different.

Illusions serve no one.

The illusions we have about ourselves make us feel good about what we do every day.

Grow up, get married, work, have babies, raise them, die.

For what? For most people, to simply return to the earth and be forgotten.

In turn, none of it matters.

As I stand over the battered body of the middle aged man who raped one of my men’s little sisters, I don’t feel sorrow over his impending doom. I don’t feel remorse.

Instead, I feel all the things they say that you shouldn’t when taking a life.

Joy.

Satisfaction.

Gratification.

His bloodied, broken body gives me peace.

The illusion that killing him should torment me isn’t real.

I’ve seen enough to know there’s only here and now, there’s no after. And whether I’m good or not has no bearing on my fate.

“I don’t want to die… please, I didn’t know she was sixteen,” he whines. The drool and blood dripping from his mouth lands in a pool in front of him, where most of his teeth now sit on the tarp below.

“I’m sorry, it wasn’t my call… I didn’t have a choice.”

“Nah… don’t make excuses. You always have a choice. It’s fucking weak to go out like that man,” Mason, my treasurer and the older brother of the girl this sick fuck drugged, raped, and recorded to keep photographic evidence of his fucked up conquests spits out as he smacks the guy they call Gator in the back of the head. Should’ve known with a nickname like Gator the guy would be a sleazeball.

Mason nods to Kai, my enforcer. Kai doesn’t say a word, he’s a brick wall, showing zero hesitation. He moves forward and assumes his position behind Gator, bracing his forehead with one hand and holding his mouth open with the other.

Mason thinks for a minute, looking into Gator’s mouth at what’s left. The pickings are slim, but he chooses a back molar. He clamps down on it with his pliers and wrenches it free from Gator’s mouth then drops the broken pieces to the ground amidst those peaceful garbled screams that sing to my soul.

My turn.

I fire up the butane torch again, time to take a little more ink off Gator’s neck and left arm where he bears the Disciples of Sin insignia.

Their club has been our club’s natural enemy for years, ever since my grandfather, Ira Wolfe, started our legacy, The Hounds of Hell in the sixties.

I grin as I see the horror on Gator’s face while I stalk toward him, the blood—dark and syrupy— leaking from his mouth now heavier than the drool.

I run my first two fingers through the flame as I eye Gator up—or what’s left of him. I don’t even know how he keeps coming back to consciousness at this point.

All we want is a name, and he’s holding out a lot longer than I thought he would.

“Time to take some more ink unless you’re ready to talk,” I tell him. In truth, we stop when the stench of burning flesh gets too strong in this small cabin.

“This is your last chance to do the right thing,” I say, preying on the human instinct that salvation is real.

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