Passionate Spirit

By Sandy Shores

At its core Passionate Spirit is a tale of romance, full of love, lust, and yes, passion. It's told against the backdrop of the story of the Jacksons and their descendants, an immensely wealthy family who settled in America well before the Revolutionary War. Unbeknown to everyone outside their clan and most within it, their wealth originated from nefarious skulduggery, though later they became well-respected icons of the American capitalistic system. Their history, including a haunting of an erotic nature long a closely guarded family secret, is told by a current member of the family who’s able to see the past and gain knowledge of the present in ways beyond the normal range of human senses, often in startling detail. Her main focus is a tale of two soul mates whose intense love for one another transcends the boundaries of the mortal human body, though they revel in the pleasures of the flesh whenever possible. This sweeping saga involving numerous generations will introduce the reader to many fascinating characters, each in their own way possessed of a passionate spirit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Mar 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9781664162839

Sandy Shores

I hold a Certified Social Worker Licence with the State of NJ. I attended Rutgers, The State University of NJ, enrolled in the Masters of Social Work Program. I graduated from Trenton State College earning a Bachelor 's Degree in Psychology. I have over 14 years of work experience helping adolescents and adults.

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Copyright © 2021 by Sandy Shores.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 03/16/2021

Xlibris

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CONTENTS

Amanda Lee

Melanie Chambers

Amanda Lee 2

Melissa and Josiah

Josiah Jackson

Margaret Jackson

Marion Jackson

Marie Delany

Marjory Donaldson

Amanda Chambers

Melissa and Joshua

Synopsis of Passionate Spirit

Amanda Lee

Hello. To all my family members and anyone else with whom they’ve chosen to share this recorded message, this vocal legacy, if you will, I have something to say right up front. I am definitely not a witch. I practice no spell casting, voodoo, or black magic, nor can I conjure up spirits. I own no tarot cards or crystal ball, and am certainly not a gypsy. I do possess a form of ESP though and some would call me a seer, but that label doesn’t work for me on a couple of levels. First of all a seer is someone who’s a prophet or fortune teller, and I never, ever see the future. That leads to my second objection to that label, because when I do gain knowledge–remote knowledge, I like to call it, since it seems to arrive without being connected to anything I’ve learned conventionally–I don’t actually see anything. There are no visions, no flashes, no dreamlike trances; information I have no business knowing just pops into my head and suddenly I simply know it. Technically I’m a clairvoyant, defined as someone having the power to perceive things that are beyond the natural range of human senses, which does describe me. That makes me sound like I know everything though, which I definitely don’t, nor do I have the ability to summon remote knowledge on demand. It happens when it happens, and that’s that. So please, like I said, I’m not a witch, soothsayer, sorceress, necromancer, or anything like that. I’ll tell you what you can call me though. Amanda. Amanda Lenore Lee to be exact, nee Amanda Chambers. I’m the daughter of Joe Chambers Junior and granddaughter of Melanie Chambers; information that should help the family members listening determine their relation to me.

Speaking of relations, I’m not the first member of the family to have the ability to gain remote knowledge either, and this I know for a fact. How do I know, you might ask? Why by remote knowledge, of course! While I do sometimes know things about strangers with whom I come into contact, or even just proximity–like knowing the names of a waitress’s husband and kids or the fact that the man at the next table is a stockbroker who’s cheating on his wife–the unsolicited facts that are by far the most detailed and hit me with the most certainty of their accuracy come from people to whom I’m related by blood, especially if they’re in the direct line of my ancestry. I’ve also received information about people who were physically close to one of my forebears at some point or another, that data particularly likely to be detailed if the two of them shared an emotional bond. Generally speaking my insights about my progenitors and others are fewer and more vague the further back those people existed, but sometimes I know things in startling detail from centuries ago. This ability is and was shared by numerous women in the family but never the men, though they can pass the trait along as my father did to me. For some reason the power to receive remote knowledge seems to get stronger with age, so many of the vague hunches or feelings I had in my youth, especially about my relatives, are now crystal clear facts.

I’ll try not to injure my arm patting myself on the back, but I had the foresight years ago to start jotting down those remote facts about my forebears as they either came to me in big chunks or seeped into my brain in bits and pieces, so I’ll be referring to my notes often as I tell my story. Yes, I actually do have a tale to tell, though technically it’s not my story for the most part. It’s a saga spanning multiple generations, involving a pair of soul mates whose intense love for one another transcends the boundaries of the mortal human body, though they revel in the pleasures of the flesh when possible as lovers have done since the dawn of time. Oh, their love is so beautiful I might cry talking about it, but if I do don’t judge me too harshly. I may be a clairvoyant, or at least a reasonable facsimile thereof, but I’m also a woman and can’t help but adore a good love story. What’s wrong with that?

Anyway, as I mentioned, other female members of the family, past and present, have experienced remote knowledge as I have–I’m sure some of you ladies listening know exactly what I’m talking about–though in most cases not precisely as I have. I seem to have more powerful convictions as to the accuracy of my unbidden enlightenments than others, and in fact some, like my grandmother Melanie for example, always attributed their revelations, as I did at first, to feelings, hunches, or that catchall cliché, feminine intuition. It was really more than any of those things, whether they knew it or not.

Speaking of my grandmother Melanie, she wrote a story for one of the sensational magazines so popular years ago which gives a general but pretty enlightening overview of our family’s history. That leads into a steamy tale that you’ll at least find shocking if not totally unbelievable, but I assure you it’s true. It’s part of the love story I alluded to, more or less, though it’s really sort of a sideline or detour, in a way. Despite the magazine’s reputation for sensationalism its editors revised the story, toning down parts of it quite a bit and removing some of it entirely, but amongst my grandmother’s papers I found a copy of the story just as she’d written it, and that’s how I’d like to share it with you. I’ll let her tell it in her own words then fill in the details later, telling you many things my grandmother never knew. You’ll notice that she had quite a well-developed sense of humor, and if you listen closely you’ll also catch some examples of remote knowledge she passed off as something else or just basically brushed off as nothing. Of course the voice you hear will still be mine, but the words will be exclusively those of my grandmother except when she’s quoting someone else. If you keep an open mind you might find her story very entertaining. Without further ado, here it is.

Melanie Chambers

My name is Melanie Chambers and I was born in Charleston, South Carolina, as were many members of my family, past and present. One that wasn’t from there but was the most famous of my forebears was Thomas Jonathan Jackson, most commonly known as Stonewall Jackson, a Confederate general I’m sure you’ve heard of. He was originally from Clarksburg, Virginia, later part of West Virginia, so as I said he wasn’t born in the great state of South Carolina, but his cousin Josiah Jackson was, a man who happens to be my great-great-grandfather.

Josiah and his beloved wife Melissa lived in the family mansion in Charleston, the very house in which generations later I resided as a child, left for a number of years, returned to as a young woman, and eventually inherited. I lived there most of my life and had some interesting times, to put it mildly, as you’ll soon hear.

Our family has been very, very wealthy since before anyone seems to be able to remember, certainly before the first of them reached the New World of North America, and I never did get a straight story of how we originally became so filthy rich. Even an antebellum newspaper clipping someone in the family saved vaguely attributed the primal source of our family fortune to the Jacksons’ purposeful, passionate spirit, which certainly is open to interpretation. I suppose they meant that we were determined, tenacious, and ardent in our pursuit of wealth–attributes that are definitely not inconsistent with the ways of American capitalism, and one would assume are traits considered admirable in our society. It’s known that once here in the colonies that eventually became the United States we owned a huge shipbuilding business, keeping some of the ships to trade with nations around the world. We later got into steel production, then steamships and railroads. Of course the money to start those businesses had to come from somewhere, and though all my relatives claimed ignorance of that source I got the distinct impression a couple of my aunts did know but declined to say. Because of that impression and perhaps due to the illusory suppositions that sometimes worm their way into my mind I always suspected skulduggery somewhere along the line, which might explain the murky history of our success. Even if that’s true it’s all water under the bridge because there’s no trace of impropriety in our business dealings now–that’s more than family pride talking; I just know in my bones that’s true though I can’t explain exactly how–and our well-established empire extends its holdings with each passing year. I certainly never went hungry or worked a day in my life, nor will any of my progeny, it seems.

The family mansion is in an area called The Battery, so called because the cannons that first fired upon Fort Sumter and thus began the Civil War are located nearby along the shore of Charleston harbor. As a child, I heard rumors that the house was haunted, and even at my tender age I noticed that the argument over the truth of that assertion was clearly divided along lines of gender. The men claimed that they had never seen nor even so much as heard anything unusual in the home, attributing the stories to, and I quote, fanciful imaginings of female hysteria. The women, however, avowed that the manor truly was inhabited by a ghost and even named him, often with a look of amusement, joy, or even rapture on their faces. He was, they insisted, none other than my great-great-grandfather Josiah Jackson.

That made sense to me on one level. I knew that there had been a number of deaths in the house, but most had been elderly people who died peacefully in their sleep. An exception to that was Josiah Jackson, it being well known in the family that he met a violent end in the manor, gunned down in the foyer while still a virile, vigorous man. Even as a child I knew the basics of that story, but it wasn’t until I was an adult that I learned all, or at least most, of the sordid details.

It seems that Josiah had left his loving wife and their two daughters at home and went off to serve as a major in the Confederate Army, even seeing action under his more famous and high-ranking cousin early on in the conflict. Apparently he made it through the war without a scratch, but came home to discover that his beloved Melissa had died from typhoid fever. They say he was driven to madness with grief and adopted a profligate, recklessly extravagant lifestyle. He caroused wantonly, visited houses of ill repute, and bedded every woman he could get his hands on, his desire for their pleasures especially keen if they bore any resemblance at all to his lost Melissa. He didn’t even care if they were married, and that was what led to his downfall.

One night, just after finishing a passionate romp with a wedded woman whose husband was supposedly out of town on business, there came a pounding at the mansion’s front door. Josiah put on some trousers but went downstairs barefooted and bare-chested, and when he opened the door was shot point-blank by the jealous husband of the woman with whom he had just fornicated. Only one shot was fired but it struck Josiah in the center of the chest, and he died right there in the vestibule lying in a pool of his own blood. You might think that would mean his soul would soon be reunited with that of his also deceased inamorata Melissa, but apparently that wasn’t the case. I know it’s not apparent to the readers of this article yet, but it soon will be to those with open minds.

Josiah’s sister and her husband came to live in the house, not only to supervise its upkeep but to help the nanny raise Josiah and Melissa’s two daughters. They were a childless couple and raised Margaret and Marion as if they were their own, giving them lots of love and making sure they were properly educated. Margaret was the older one so she inherited the mansion the Jacksons had built, but when she got married and took her husband’s name no one named Jackson ever lived there again.

Now let me fast-forward many years to the approximate time I inherited the house. My parents had separated early on and I spent a lot of years living with my father. Sadly, he died in a car accident when I was still a young woman, and I moved back into the family mansion. My unfortunate mother, God rest her soul, was suffering from both physical and mental debilities at that time, many years earlier than you would expect, and really needed my help. She had her good moments and bad, and when I’d been back a couple of weeks I was at her bedside chatting with her when she said cryptically, Has he come for you yet? I asked who she meant but she continued as if she hadn’t heard me and added, He’ll come for you. You look even more like her than I do. She paused with an unsettling grin, ignoring my questions about what he and what her, then concluded with, Oh yes, he’ll come for you just like he did for me. I know he will. I continued to press my questions, but her attention had drifted off and it was no use. I wrote off her statements as the ramblings of a ravaged mind, discounting them entirely at that time. Mom had a lot more bad days than good after that, and soon I was the owner of the family mansion.

I was an only child and lived in that big house mostly by myself for a few years, though I did have two of my female cousins live there with me at separate times. When I was living alone before either of them moved in, one night I suddenly awoke in the wee hours of the morning and felt an irresistible, inexplicable desire to go downstairs. I was wearing a nightgown and panties as I usually did, so I just slipped on my slippers and gave in to whatever it was that seemed to be pulling me downstairs. There was plenty of light from the city coming in through the windows, so I didn’t turn on any lights.

I was drawn into the library and momentarily stood there in the semidarkness in front of the life-sized portraits of Melissa and Josiah Jackson, wondering why I was there. I couldn’t really make out their likenesses at that time, but I’d been familiar with them since I was a child and knew them well. The bottoms of the frames interrupted the baseboard and were all the way down against the floor, which gave the appearance that Melissa and Josiah were actually standing in the room.

I had always been struck by what a good-looking man my great-great- grandfather had been; his handsome features and tall, powerful body absolutely resplendent in his Confederate uniform. His confident bearing, his smirking smile topped with a neat mustache, his intent gaze, and his hand resting on the hilt of his elegant sword all seemed to paint him–it was a portrait, after all–as a man of action, flair, and style. He was almost a caricature of manliness.

Melissa stood about the same height as me, making her a foot or so shorter than her imposing husband. In contrast to his abundantly evident masculine élan she seemed so soft, demure, decorous, and proper; her Mona Lisa smile exuding very feminine grace and ladylike propriety. I know it’s not possible to truly know someone simply by studying their portrait, but somehow I still felt as if I did. It was easy to get the impression that she’d been a kind, sweet, loving woman, very suited to being a wife and mother. On top of all that–no speculation needed on this point–she was very beautiful.

Having said that what I’m going to say next is going to sound egotistical, but I can’t help it because it’s true. Once I had grown up and filled out, if it hadn’t been for the outfit she was wearing in her portrait–a prim, dignified dress of black and gray with white lace ruffles at the neckline, cuffs, and hem, which was level with her ankles–I could easily have gotten the feeling that I was looking in the mirror instead of at a painting of my ancestor. We had the same long, wavy, dark hair, eyes so dark they appeared black, an aristocratic English nose, a fairly wide, straight mouth with lips of medium thickness, and a strong chin. Forgive my immodesty, but now that I’m old and have lost my looks it seems only fair that I should occasionally be allowed to remind myself that I was once a beautiful woman, just like my great-great-grandmother.

As I mentioned I couldn’t see the details of those oil paint depictions that night, but as I stood in front of them wondering what had drawn me there suddenly I noticed some yellowish, lightly glowing, swirling particles in front of Josiah’s portrait. At first I thought they were merely motes of dust catching the light coming through the window, but quickly realized that light was passing five or six feet in front of the gently whirling specks, and couldn’t be the source of their illumination. More and more luminous particles joined the stately dance, seemingly appearing from nowhere, becoming more hurried in their motions and radiating more brightly–turning from yellow to white–as their numbers increased. Soon they were whirling like a tornado as I watched in amazement, my body going cold with fear and my hair standing on end when I realized they were taking on a distinctly human shape. I was absolutely terrified!

Suddenly, as one, the glowing particles winked out and all motion ceased, and it was clear that I was no longer alone in the library. It took my eyes a few seconds to readjust to the darkness after the loss of illumination from the radiant motes, but when they did I could see that standing in the shadows was what appeared to be the figure of Josiah Jackson, the very specter reputed to haunt the house! Now I knew that my female relatives had been correct, for there he was standing before me. I don’t know how I managed not to swoon from terror.

In my state of trepidation and turmoil it took a moment for me to realize that Josiah didn’t appear exactly as he did in the portrait behind him. Oh, his handsome features were the same from what I could see in the low light, but his splendid uniform was nowhere in evidence as he was clad only in a pair of black trousers and nothing else. Once again that made sense to me on some level, since that was how he was reportedly dressed when he was shot and killed. If I may inject a little humor into what seemed at the time to be a grave situation–or perhaps more appropriately, an out of grave situation–I guess you don’t get to bring a change of clothes to the afterlife.

I flinched so dramatically I almost fell down when a rich, deep, manly voice called out clearly, Melissa! My sweet, darling wife and light of my life! You’ve returned to me! Oh, I’ve missed you so!

He started moving toward me, and I involuntarily began stepping back. I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting to see when he stepped into the light streaming through the window–some floating, shimmery, translucent apparition I could see through, I guess–but when the light hit him I was shocked to see that he appeared solid and perfectly human, with a healthy-looking complexion and a gleam in his gorgeous blue eyes as he looked me up and down lustfully. His wavy, very light brown, almost sandy-blond hair was cut to medium length as in his portrait, but instead of being neatly combed had a disheveled look as if he’d just gotten out of bed, which of course he had–he hadn’t been sleeping, but he’d been in bed nonetheless–only a minute or so before his death. The light-brown mustache beneath his strong, manly nose was perfectly trimmed; his jawline also strong and very masculine. As pleasing to the eye as he was on the wall in paint on canvas he was even more strikingly handsome in person, if that’s the right choice of words, and his dashing, extremely attractive face in combination with his large, powerful, muscular, manly physique took my breath away. I’m sure the fact that I was being stalked by a ghost also contributed to my breathlessness.

I noticed that even his smile seemed natural and very human, much like ones I’d seen on other men who’d looked me over, especially if they were devilish rogues. That was the look he had, but in fairness to my ancestral phantasm I must remember that he thought I was his wife, for good reason since I resembled her so much. I don’t think it makes a man, or a spirit, a devilish rogue because he lusts after his wife. It seems like a good thing to me, and I imagine most women would agree.

While I continued to step back Josiah’s ghost moved relentlessly forward, his muscles rippling as he put one bare foot in front of the other and walked with catlike grace. He persisted in calling me Melissa, his love, his sweetheart, et cetera, at one point professing his undying love for me. I thought that was a rather poor choice of words under the circumstances, though instead of mentioning that I tried to convince him–talking to a wraith for the first time in my life–that I was not Melissa but her great- great-granddaughter. He didn’t acknowledge anything I said but just continued on in the same vein as if I hadn’t spoken at all–typical of a man, even a dead one, it seems–still declaring his love and affection. He was not to be deterred.

When I ran out of room and my back slammed into a wall of books, I had a moment of blind panic and again almost passed out. Suddenly though, my thoughts went back to the accounts my relatives had given of meetings with the house ghost, and it occurred to me that though they hadn’t really given any truly illuminating details of those encounters, they had certainly never given any indications that he had done them any harm. In fact, they spoke with merry mischief in their eyes, some with looks of joy or even rapture on their faces as I mentioned before. Those recollections eased my mind somewhat, and I remained conscious.

Still, almost instinctively I suppose, I tried to slide off to my right toward the door as Josiah approached. I didn’t make it though, because he closed the last few steps with supernatural quickness, I think I could say, shooting his left arm out to one of the bookshelves and blocking my escape. He placed his right hand on my shoulder, gently slid it up my neck, then affectionately caressed my cheek, still uttering words of love. Just as I had been shocked by his solid, lifelike appearance, so was I surprised by the human feel of his touch. I had expected something ghastly or at least ghostly, perhaps cold, clammy, and insubstantial. I couldn’t have been more wrong, as instead his caress was warm, pleasant, and tangibly physical, easing my tension a bit.

Continuing his litany of love, he moved in close enough that I could feel his warm breath on my face–who even knew ghosts breathed? I didn’t–and I noticed that rather than possessing the stench of death he had a clean, wonderfully manly smell, complete with a hint of cologne. He seemed to be drinking in my scent too and appeared pleased by what he detected, just as I was, surprisingly enough. I’m sure on some subconscious level, if ghosts even have one, we were analyzing one another’s pheromones, assuming, of course, that ghosts have those too.

Apparently sensing that I was no longer trying to escape–it’s true that I wasn’t as afraid after experiencing his warm, gentle touch and clean, delightful smell–he placed his left hand on my cheek too then softly ran both hands down my neck, over my shoulders, and onto my torso. He lightly brushed the outsides of my breasts through the material of my nightgown on the way down, his hands finally coming to a rest on my hips. It seemed to me he was a little too familiar; in more ways than one, I guess, since the word familiar is another term for a spirit.

Since he was about a foot taller than me, my gaze naturally fell on his broad, manly chest, which was covered, though not thickly, with short, light-brown hair. I saw no hint of a bullet wound, but surprised myself by reaching up and running my right hand from one well-developed pectoral muscle to the other, confirming through tactile examination that no injury was evident. I was further surprised by how pleased and stimulated I was by the hardness of his muscles and softness of his masculine fur, but less than astonished that my touch clearly exhilarated him as well. He shivered with pleasure, interrupted his romantic recitation, closed his eyes, then threw his head back and moaned softly. He brought his head forward and opened his eyes when I withdrew my touch, then smiled at me and changed his tune a bit, saying, Oh, my sweet Melissa. I want you. I need you. I have to have you. Suddenly he opened his eyes a little wider, got sort of a leering look to go with his wicked smile, then with strong emphasis on the second word, said, "I will have you!"

I had a sneaking suspicion I knew what he meant by that, my conviction becoming stronger when he pulled me toward him as he pushed in closer and I distinctly felt the bulge of a huge erection pressed against my belly. My eyes went wide and his suggestive grin got bigger, and this time he not only emphasized the word will but underscored