Tangled Passion Read Online Free PDF

otherwise, his voice seemed to have briefly deserted him and his entire body felt like it had been drained of the last drop of energy. “He told Mama that he wants me,” Ashana added and broke down.
    “He told your mother that?” Jonah asked very feebly, his heart already in excruciating pain.  Ashana nodded slowly and Jonah nodded in return, urging Ashana to continue.
    She went ahead to tell Jonah how Massa Longstands took offence to his son’s interest in her and about the young man’s stubborn refusal to let go. “Now they have ordered me and Mama to get ready to be sent to a different plantation in three days…” she added, her body convulsing uncontrollably as she wept.
    Jonah was already on his feet; he was pacing back and forth like a desperate lion in a cage. “How did you find out all this?” He stuttered, his mind was completely fogged, and he hadn’t the slightest idea what to do. As a matter of fact, trying to figure out what to do was beginning to make him dizzy.
    “Edwards brought my mother home,” Ashana said, still trembling, her tear glands unrelenting in pumping tears. “Mama fainted after Massa told her to get ready to be shipped to another plantation with me; she is still lying in bed and hasn’t eaten anything since she was brought back.”
    Jonah paused for a minute, his mind had suddenly gone completely blank and his body unresponsive. When he recovered, he sat next to Ashana and enveloped her shivering body in his arms. He understood how she felt and how her mother, Marecia must be feeling. After all it was her transfer from a previous plantation to the Fort that had caused her to become separated from Ashana’s father.
    According to Ashana, when the plantation where her parents used to work shut down and the slaves were sold off to different plantations across the island, her parents had begged the slave master to send them to the same plantation so the family could be together. But their request was bluntly turned down. Marecia and Ashana were sent to the Fort while Ashana’s father was sent to a different plantation. Ever since, Marecia had neither seen nor heard from the man she loved so much, worse still, the mother and child were completely oblivious as to which plantation he was sent and sometimes feared he might have passed away.
    So many times when Jonah visited Ashana on a Sunday, which was a day of rest, Marecia would engage the two with the story of how she met Ashana’s father as if it was the very first time she was telling it. This removed all doubts in Jonah’s mind that even though it had been many years since the separation and even though she was now in her old age, Marecia still thought a lot about her husband and he admired her for that.
    “When they took him from me, I left my heart, my soul, and spirit with him and since then I have never felt, seen, heard or smelt anything—ever,” was how she always ended the story. When she spoke of her husband, her words were overloaded with emotion and anyone could see in her eyes that if she had one last wish it would be to lay eyes on Ashana’s father once again.
    “We leave tomorrow night!” Jonah blurted suddenly, jumping to his feet then helping Ashana to hers.
    “What?” Ashana queried, her eyes wide-open and fully stretched out. It was only one of a million questions that had been automatically generated by her head in response to Jonah’s statement.
    “Tomorrow night, get a few things and meet me here after we return from the plantation– don’t be late and don’t tell anyone,” Jonah said like a captain issuing instructions that could not be questioned but only obeyed.
    Ashana went quiet, not bothering to vocalize the questions that flooded her mind as she and Jonah started heading back to the quarters. It was a long quiet walk; they held hands and squeezed them occasionally as if transmitting secret messages that couldn’t be vocalized.
    At the intersection where they must part, he turned around