Golden Eyes

Jackson knew that it would be nighttime soon, and his throat had this scratchy, dry feeling from the heated air blustering past his face as he barreled down the road on his motorcycle. The heat was starting to die down finally, but he decided to pull into his local watering hole. His motorcycle was about all he cared about it seemed, but as he pulled onto the graveled parking lot, he let out a growl to himself like he always did. "Damned gravel is gonna dent my chassis one of these days," he complained to himself even as he parked his motorcycle and let go of the handlebars. He took his time removing his helmet and taking off his gloves, but something distracted him, and he glanced to the left. Jackson saw that there was another biker there, and Jackson paused to watch him scream in this woman's face. He bit his bottom lip hard as he weighed the pros and cons of getting involved in the fight, but his decision was decided for him when he witnessed the man lifting his leather-gloved clad hand to slap the woman across her face hard enough she fell to the gravel with a panicked cry holding her jaw. Jackson dismounted his motorcycle and strode over, his muscled body rippling with rage as he immediately headbutted the man to the nose, intent on breaking it with a primal sort of growl. He heard the satisfied c***k of bone as he watched the man fall to the ground, stunned that his nose was now streaming blood and broken. He looked to the woman, noting that her nose had started to bleed, but the small bit of blood barely caught his attention in the duty wind that blew through between the three of them as he stood over the biker. "What the hell man, you broke my nose!" the biker yelled, confusedly. "Well yeah...I really dislike men hitting women." Jackson supplied, his normally green eyes narrowing with malice towards the downed man. He normally didn’t get involved, but something about this man made him angrier than usual. Jackson suddenly straddled the man, he got in a few good punches to the man's eyes, and jaw before people pulled him off. As the two men struggled in the patch of dusty gravel, the woman witnessed Jackson’s eyes flash gold in his anger. She looked away hurriedly, passing it off as a hallucination. "S'what you get, scumbag. Don't f*****g hit innocent people, pathetic asshole." Jackson growled as he slowly shook off the other men that half patted him on the back in what Jackson assumed was mild approval for his sudden intervention. He intended on escorting the woman inside the bar, but she wouldn't budge so Jackson gave a shrug of his shoulders. He pulled his ragged leather Jacket back into place, turned on his heel, and mounted the wooden steps into the bar like it was the last hill to a victory for him. Jackson pushed open the door and blinked as he gave his eyes time to adjust to the smoky haze that sieged his senses before he decided to take a seat at the bar. He also greeted the bartender with a firm nod and a charming smile shortly after sitting down. His nose was somewhat wrinkled with the sour stink of sweat from the other patrons that clung to his nostrils like a leech. The scent was also drenched in alcohol and smoky with menthol cigarettes. "Hey Mary, honey...you're lookin' good tonight. Y'mind hookin' me up with a Tequila an' lime like usual?" Jackson asked with a slightly tempting lilt to his voice, while he slid over a five-dollar bill as payment across the abused bar top. Jackson thought back to when he had assisted Mary in finding the piece filled with scratch marks from knives, carved graffiti marks, and water-damage spots with a slight smirk. "You sure I can't tempt you into something harder, Jackson, y'know this bar talks when you start in with your white-knight shit." Mary winked at him while flashing him an approving look even as she was chastising him for his bad behavior. She leaned over the bar and touched his hand, aware that he was reminiscing. "Yeah, and? Let 'em talk. I didn't see any of their asses steppin' up to help that woman." He raised his voice intentionally, and then glanced over his shoulder when the bar went dead silent. He waited for a beat and everyone started talking again as if he hadn't said anything. He gave a firm nod to himself, reassured that no one was going to pick a fight over his antics. Mary shook her head, her Nutella-brown hair shimmying around her makeup-covered face as she slid the tequila with lime over to him. "One day Jackson, you're gonna meet someone that is gonna test that big heart of yours. I'll be sittin' here eattin' popcorn when she comes too." "Nah, Mary, y'know I only have eyes for you, don'tcha?" Jackson teased, obviously, there was nothing between them but alcohol now from anyone on the outside looking in, so he raised his tequila and lime, toasted to her, and then downed it in one go. He was so involved in the alcohol’s taste that lingered on his lips as he smacked them together appreciatively, that he missed the front bar door opening. Both Jackson and Mary's eyes flicked to the person that had just stepped through and Jackson's breath was stolen by her. Her curly red hair bounced on her shoulders, unrestrained, her walk was graceful but hurried as she avoided pressing into any of the strange people around her. He inhaled and was assaulted by her smell, lavender, sweat, scorched flesh, and some sort of fruity shampoo he couldn't identify, but she came right up to the bar, ignoring the mystified Jackson to address Mary. "Hey, ma'am, you have a phone behind there? I'm so sorry, my car's broken down about a mile down the road, and my phone is dead. Could you help a girl out?" She smiled, seeming totally at ease as she dug in her wallet to pull out a ten to pass to Mary. "And if you could get me water and something to eat, I would love it." Mary shared a look with Jackson and nearly giggled watching him, thinking that he looked like a love-struck puppy before she nodded to the woman. "Of course, Sug. Take a seat, I'll get you the phone, water, and some fries, okay?" Mary took out an order pad and wrote down a large order of cheese fries for the woman and hung it up for the cook calling out: "Ricardo! Order up!" before she went to get a glass of ice and water which she set in front of the woman. She also leaned over the counter and snapped her fingers in front of Jackson's face three times before he gave her a bewildered expression and nervously raked back his black hair. Mary and the stranger giggled a little before Jackson recovered with a grunt. He moved over to be a little closer to her, letting his personal space bubble envelop her with his smell of the dusty Arizona twilight, cigar smoke, sweat, and a delightful sort of muskiness that the woman seemed to enjoy. "Hey darlin', my name's Jackson, most people 'round here calls me Jack. If you need a ride somewhere, a hotel, I can take you on my motorcycle." he offered genuinely. The woman paused in her gulping down of the water to look at him, the wariness was obvious to Mary and to Jackson both. She smiled at those plump lips of hers that just begged to be kissed before she spoke: "Wow, I uhh...never met a white knight that rode a motorcycle, you have any tattoos too there, Cowboy?" Jackson smirked to himself and glanced to Mary, who had seen his tattoos before she nodded before Jackson got up without a word, his well-trimmed body didn't falter as he took off his leather Jacket and laid it aside, then he took off his slightly dusty-looking brown t-shirt to let her see his skin from behind. On his back, there was a coyote howling to the full moon halfway down his back. On his left shoulder blade were skull and crossbones, with a rose coming out of its mouth. He glanced back to catch her reaction. The woman was clearly taken aback by the elaborate artwork of the coyote, and she caught his eyes with her own hazel ones, but she was distracted by his sudden movement. Jackson went to pull down his jeans on one side of his chiseled hip just a little to show her his joke tattoo of a naked woman with a handful of aces and a gun in her hand hanging between her legs to hide her slit. She actually bent a little to see that below the tattoo is the name "Mary" and that was all the women was allowed to see as Jackson pulled on his T-shirt and his leather Jacket, leaving the woman flabbergasted but laughing. "Mary, she's laughin' atcha, charge her double, eh?" Jackson winked at his former flame before the woman offered her hand to him which he took in a firm grip, shaking her whole arm practically with his strength before he realized what he was doing. "My name's Rowan...Rowan Taggert." she ventured before she gave the room a wary glance and a look like she was rethinking giving this dashing scoundrel her name. "An' I was laughing at the fact that you must have been really drunk to get her tattooed like that on your hip. Was he really drunk, Mary?" Mary cackled a little, she had been wiping down a beer glass before the showing of the tattoos and she answered with a mischievous grin on her face. "Oh yes, completely smashed, told me he loved me and wanted to marry me, so I told him I couldn't marry a p***y, he had to get his first tattoo and it better be one of me. So, Jackson here, he designs it himself, 'cause back then I wasn't just a bartender, you feel me? Well, the tattoo artist almost laughs him out of the shop, but he convinced him, the next day, Jackson shows me this and I walked down the aisle with him a week later. Walked down a court aisle two years later too.... he looks good, doesn't he? But there ain't a woman alive that can tie down Jackson long enough to make him stay one place, Miss Taggert. You remember that." "Awwww Mary, hellfire woman, why did you have to go and tell her that? I just wanted to roam, and you wanted to stay here and buy the damn bar, c'mon now." Jackson said, defending himself. "Because she needs to know that you roam, Jackson, you ain't a settlin' type of man." Mary riposted with a smirk as she got to see him squirm, and she liked to torment him at times. "All due respect, Miss Mary, but I'm not lookin' to tie down a man, I'm tryin' to run from some trouble I got myself in... So, Mister Jackson if you could give me that ride, that'd be amazing after I eat these fries." Rowan piped up just as Mary brought her the batch of fries fresh out of the fryer. “You got it, gorgeous,” Jackson replied easily enough, making it seem like he was at ease, but in reality, his muscles were tense and the little muscle in his jaw was flexing with tension as his eyes raked over Rowan’s hourglass frame hungrily. He nodded to himself and raked his hand through his black hair. Jackson continued to watch Rowan and Mary while Rowan devoured her fries before he leaned just close enough to catch another whiff of her scent. I should be able to track her now, long-distance. She seems hungry though, I wonder how long since she ate somethin’? he wondered to himself before he went to open his mouth and ask however, Rowan turned to him. “I’m ready to go, sorry. I haven’t had anythin’ since about six am when I left all that trouble and started drivin’. Mister Jackson, are you armed by chance?” Rowan asked, her eyes wide with innocence and she didn’t seem to have a tell Jackson would expect from a woman trying to con him. Jackson arched a brow and half turned his muscled frame to watch her subtly, he even caught her shiver as his green eyes locked onto her face seriously. He knew that sometimes his intensity had scared Mary, so he tried to be gentle when he spoke, but to his own ears he still sounded gruff and rough around the edges. “Yeah, most bikers are armed in one way or ‘nother, Rowan. You mentioned trouble before…. what sorta trouble?” he asked. “Oh, uh… well. My ex-boyfriend, he uh, didn’t want to let me go. Let’s put it that way. He’s been huntin’ me and I’m tryin’ to get to California, I’ll be safe there. But the heat in the desert was not kind to my car and it overheated.” Rowan spoke a little haltingly, but still, Jackson could tell that her heart rate didn’t stutter from any sort of fear or deceit. He took his time in leaning back onto his stool and nodding slowly as he thought this over. He shared a look with Mary who was watching the two, a look that Mary knew well. “Oh, hell no, Jackson. Don’t you even dare go fightin’ anyone’s battles but yer own!” She spoke suddenly and loudly enough that the bar hushed all over again as they glanced over. Mary was as stoic as a big steamship, so it was rare for her to have outbursts. Jackson watched as she shook her head, sending her brown hair all over the place as her forehead creased with three new worry-lines. “Mary, calm down, eh? I can handle an ex-boyfriend.” Jackson gave an easy shrug and suddenly stood up as he left Mary his usual tip and rolled his shoulders before turning back to hold out is hand to Rowan patiently. Jackson could see Mary was staggered by this action, and that her jaw nearly dropped to the floor as Jackson attempted to confiscate Rowan’s hand and when she didn’t resist him, he pulled her in close enough to get a whiff of his musk as he escorted her from the building. He tried to keep his thoughts on reaching her car, but his head swimming with her softly citrus scent that invaded his nostrils. When Rowan and Jackson had exited, both of them lingered on the porch, Jackson inhaled the cleaner air of the parking lot as the old wood creaked in slight distress with their combined body weight. He let Rowan leave his general vicinity, but he watched how she moved and noted that she favored her left leg with a slight limp, and she seemed uncoordinated on the gravel. Perhaps a city woman. He thought to himself.