Taken in Tahoe (Taken and Torn Book 3) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Taken in Tahoe

  a holiday tale

  Sam JD Hunt

  Copyright © 2017 by Sam JD Hunt

  All rights reserved. This work or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead or undead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Published in the United States of America

  First Published, 2017.

  Cover design: Sam JD Hunt

  Cover images © DepositPhotos

  Cover models: Juta Valdmane, Gints Valdmanis

  About Taken in Tahoe

  Taken in Tahoe, Rex Renton finds himself battling the sins of his dark past. Stranded in a record snowfall, he fights to protect the two people who have become his family, Penelope Sedgewick and Nathaniel Slater. As Rex battles the inner demons that threaten to destroy him, a mysterious letter from a dead man throws him directly into the eye of the storm.

  This fateful Christmas will test the trio in ways they never imagined—can their rare three-way love survive the evilness that seeks to destroy them?

  Taken in Tahoe is a holiday installment of the Taken and Torn triad series.

  Taken in Tahoe can be read as a holiday novella standalone, but is best enjoyed after reading:

  Taken by Two

  Torn from Two

  “It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled ’till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.”

  - Dr. Seuss

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  New Year’s Eve

  Also by Sam JD Hunt

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  I was in love with two men, and they were in love with me.

  No, we didn’t have some love triangle—they also were in love with each other. Rex, Nate, and I had a love like no other. Through the most unlikely storms we clung to our love shared by three—despite all odds, we made it work. We were in love that winter—a fierce, all-consuming love that shut out the world and insulated us against the hate. Or so we thought.

  It was just after Thanksgiving when it all started. I was at home in Colombia, just out of a warm bath and wrapped up in front of Netflix with my two men, when I got the text from my father asking me to come home to Las Vegas for the holidays. Well, summoning us, actually. He was having his annual New Year’s Eve charity gala at the resort he owned, and wanted the novelty of his only daughter with her two husbands.

  “I still can’t get over your dad being okay with us,” Rex said as I stared at my phone.

  Nate reached for the remote and paused the show we were binge watching together.

  “It certainly took my family some time to get used to the fact that I was banging a dude,” Nate said with a shake of his head.

  “Being banged,” Rex corrected with a squeeze of Nate’s thigh.

  “I’m pitching tonight, fool.” Nate poked Rex in the ribs.

  “Fight me for it, big guy,” Rex said, pulling us both closer to him.

  Rex was our protector; our King Rex, we jokingly called him. He’d brought us both to his walled compound deep in the jungles of Colombia where we’d made a life together.

  “We’re not going are we?” I looked at Rex—I hadn’t been home in over six months. I missed my family, but leaving our cocoon always made me nervous.

  “Could we go early and maybe see some snow at Christmas? I miss seasons sometimes,” Nate said.

  “Penny,” Rex said as he looked to me. “I’m not doing the Christmas thing, but are you okay with going back to Vegas?”

  “I guess so,” I admitted. My relationship with my father was complicated, but I loved the idea of being home again. “And Nate wants snow, so I guess we could do a week in Tahoe and then maybe head down to Vegas for Dad’s New Year’s Eve thing?”

  Rex nodded and pointed to the TV. “Settled. Now get me back to the show and afterwards, I’m fucking you both.”

  “Romantic, “ I teased with an eye roll.

  Rex’s aversion to Christmas came up again weeks later when we were packing.

  “How can a guy with the Virgin Mary inked into his skin not celebrate Christmas?” I asked as I searched for cold-weather gear.

  “I don’t hate Christmas, I just don’t really do it. This whole time of year brings back bad memories for me, that’s all. You guys go without me. Let me wallow here with some good bourbon.”

  Rex was ruining my plans, so I did what I do best—I pouted. With my arms around his powerful waist, I looked up into his deep blue eyes. “But it’s our first Christmas together—the three of us. Forget the old memories and make new ones. You love to ski—Tahoe is perfect.”

  He sighed and pulled me closer. “I’ll do a couple of weeks in Tahoe if it’ll make you happy, but no holiday shit.”

  I ran my hand across his muscled back, under his waistband, and down his jeans.

  “Just a little tinsel maybe.”

  “No,” he said as my hand slid further down his hard ass.

  “Cookies then, you love cookies. Snowflakes, maybe?”

  “None,” he said, breathing harder as my finger wandered down his crack.

  “What if Nate and I do that thing you like?”

  His heart was pounding. “Even both of your tongues there, Princess, won’t make me do the Christmas thing.”

  A few weeks later, we landed in Reno in Nate’s business jet. We had reservations at the nicest resort in the Lake Tahoe area, and even if Rex was Scrooge about Christmas, Nate and I were excited to ski and be pampered back in the States.

  We rented a massive SUV and headed out with me at the wheel.

  It didn’t take long for Rex to tap me on the head.

  “What?” I peered out the windshield as the snow fell like fluffy down.

  “Slow the fuck down.” Rex was glaring at me from the backseat, but I ignored him. Nate was in the passenger seat next to me, snoring as usual. No one could sleep anywhere, anytime like my Nate.

  “I’m doing seventy-five in a seventy, I’m good.” I pressed a little harder on the gas with the pointed toe of my boot. I’d driven those mountain roads since I was sixteen and got a job at a nearby ski resort—I didn’t need even King Rex telling me how to drive.

  “Penny, I’m going to spank your fine ass if you don’t dial it back a notch. This shit is freezing.” Rex was pissed, I could tell, but I wasn’t about to slow down—I needed to pee and we weren’t far. “Besides, I have a slight change to make in our plans—”

  Just as I started to argue, I felt the heavy vehicle skid as I swerved to go around a slow-moving minivan—the road curved but I did not. Our SUV went into full-slide.
r />   “Fuccckkk! Penny, don’t jerk the wheel!” But of course it was too late to listen to Rex’s advice. I’d already over-corrected from the skid and was spinning off the road—directly toward a tree.

  We came to a stop, thanks to the heavy snow, as the bumper hit the trunk of the tree as if in slow motion. With a sickening crack, the tree toppled.

  “Well, that was close,” I said, glancing at the still-sleeping Nate. “How did he sleep through that?”

  I heard Rex unclick his seatbelt and his head popped between us. “He’s slept through morning sex before. Are you okay?”

  I nodded. “He sleeps through us having sex in the morning all the time.”

  “No, I mean, he’s slept through…me fucking him before.”

  “You’re crazy!”

  “I’m serious!” We laughed as Nate snored.

  Rex stepped out of the car and climbed through the foot-high snow. With his bare hands, he pushed the tree from the hood of the car and gave me the thumbs up sign.

  “Nate’s driving,” he said when he got back in the backseat, covered in fluffy white snow.

  “No damn way,” I protested. “We’ll never get there and I have to pee.”

  “It’s squat-city for you, babycakes. You’re done at the wheel and I have to do this live chat with that survival group in five minutes.” He ran his fingers through Nate’s coppery hair. “Wake up, sleeping beauty. I need you to drive.”

  “Wha-what happened?” Nate yawned, his long legs stretching as he struggled to wake up.

  “Penny tried to kill us.”

  “Again?”

  Yes, I was known to drive a little fast. Rex was the only one of the three of us who really should have been driving, but he did anything and everything to get out of driving. He preferred to sit in the back seat and bitch at us.

  Nate, however, drove slower than a mail truck. We used to laugh at him, driving his Corvette at a blistering fifty-five miles per hour down the highway. With him at the wheel, I’d never be able to hold it until Tahoe, and we were in the middle of nowhere.

  “Someone come with me, I’ve got to pee.” Neither of my chivalrous men even looked away from their phones at my request. “Fine,” I said with the slam of the car door.

  It was cold—damn cold. Which made me have to pee even more. The snow continued to fall—at least we’d have a white Christmas at this rate. The cars whizzed by, far too fast for the icy highway, as I struggled to get my less-than-practical stiletto boots through the snow.

  I’d done weeks of survival training with Rex and his clients; I was quite capable of peeing in the wilderness. But, I learned, it wasn’t exactly easy to pop a squat in skin-tight jeggings and thigh-high stiletto boots. When I’d decided that morning to dress sexy for my men, the idea of a roadside pee wasn’t exactly at the forefront of my thoughts.

  Finally, with my freezing hands grasping a tiny tree trunk, I was ready to empty my bursting bladder. My mother used to say her eyeballs were floating, and I certainly felt that way as I let loose. And, of course, as the urine flowed I felt the warmth of pee running down my shivering legs.

  Even worse—as I shifted to hopefully adjust the urine stream, the thing leapt out at me. I’d been on guard the whole time watching for bigger threats—what I didn’t expect was this giant mangy rodent of a thing to leap out at me from the bushes.

  It was on me, its wiry hair against the side of my cheek. I heard myself scream, howl, cry like a baby.

  “Why’d you disturb this raccoon, Princess?”

  I wanted to kill him, but I was too busy lying in a warm spot of my own pee in the blanket of snow. But the thing was off of me, thank God.

  “Fuck!” I howled as my eyes focused on Rex holding the beast by the scruff of his neck like a cat.

  “Such language.”

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

  “Swear one more time and I’m tossing him back to cuddle.”

  I wanted to defy him, but I knew Rex too well. He’d do it.

  “Fine, thank you, please get him away from me.” I gritted my teeth—I just wanted to get back in the car, to get to our luxury ski resort in Tahoe, to be pampered in the spa before we dressed for a five-star dinner.

  “I think we should take this guy with us to make stew with.” Rex was eye-to-eye with the hissing mammal.

  “Please put that creature down! Aren’t they rabid?”

  “Probably,” he said. “I’m pretty sure I’ve had rabies for years, though.”

  “That would explain a lot.”

  He chuckled and gently tossed the terrified raccoon toward a patch of underbrush. It scurried away, and Rex reached a hand toward me.

  “I didn’t know you were into golden showers, Princess.”

  “Funny, but I will need a shower soon.” He pulled me to my feet and helped me pull up the tight pants—not an easy feat with peed-on legs. I was shivering as he pulled me into his arms.

  “There’s a tub but no shower at this place we’re going.”

  “What? At the Ritz Carlton?” I knew there was a luxurious shower and a tub; I’d stayed there countless times growing up in Nevada.

  “Oh, that. Change of plans; remember I said that? We’re going to a cabin instead.”

  “No,” I whined.

  “Just for a few days, then the Ritz. I want you two alone—free of distractions. Just for a short time, then I promise I’ll do the luxury thing. Indulge me?”

  I nodded, my spa dreams fading. It was hard to say no to Rex. And, in the back of mind, I thought maybe a night or two in a cabin might get him feeling festive.

  We walked hand in hand back to the car.

  “So you what, had a little thing out there without me?” Nate was in the driver’s seat, painstakingly adjusting every mirror. It took him forever to just drive.

  “Penny tried to adopt a pet before pissing all over herself.”

  “Classic.”

  I climbed into the passenger’s seat and slammed the door.

  Rex managed to push the weighty SUV out of the snowdrift—neither of us bothering to help him.

  When we finally re-entered the heavy holiday traffic, I asked, “Where is this cabin? Please tell me there’s Wi-Fi.”

  “Cabin?” Nate asked. “I thought we were skiing.”

  “King Rex here, in his infinite wisdom, decided we’d rather rough it for a few days first.”

  “Cool,” Nate said as he turned the radio on.

  I wanted to smack him. “Nate, do you really want to spend time in some fricking rustic cabin foraging for food? Melting snow? When we could be at the Ritz?”

  “Settle down, Penelope,” Rex said from the back, looking up from his phone. “This place is decent—a special ops buddy lent it to us, another doc. There’s power, running water, and it’s stocked with food, and he assured me, drink. This isn’t about survival; it’s about us being alone. So, yeah, no Wi-Fi. And he said the cell coverage is spotty, which is why I need to get this business with my clients out of the way.”

  “Secluded?” Nate looked at Rex in the rearview mirror.

  “Yeah,” he answered.

  “So, really loud sex.”

  “Really loud,” Rex answered.

  I smiled—as shitty as the last twenty minutes had been, I adored these two men and couldn’t wait to get naked with them.

  Chapter Two

  Later that afternoon, I slept through Rex carrying me into the cabin. I almost slept through him placing me on the giant feather bed. I nearly fell back asleep as he started a fire in the massive fireplace. Nate cuddled up next to me, his eyes closing in exhaustion.

  I watched as Rex filled the massive claw-foot tub, squirting in bubbles from a nearby glass container. I took a deep breath as he lifted me from the bed and stood me up at the edge of the tub.

  “Let’s get my Princess cleaned up first and then we’ll get some sleep, okay?” He undressed me and tossed my clothes to the side.

  “Sleep? No, not yet. I want you.”
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br />   He held my hand as I stepped into the tub. “It’s late. Tomorrow, I promise.”

  I didn’t mean to pout, but I did. “Get in the tub with me.”

  “Penny, you wear me out. Lean back, I’ll wash you.”

  I slid back into the tub, the soothing warmth of the water relaxing me. Rex took the sponge hanging from the faucet and dunked it into the suds.

  I closed my eyes—maybe cabin life wasn’t so bad. It was certainly better than the tent we often shared during his survival courses.

  “Ah,” I exhaled.

  “Mm, maybe I’m not that tired,” he said, stroking the sponge across a hardening nipple.

  “Tomorrow, you’re right.”

  He leaned in and kissed me. My arms wrapped around his neck, pulling him closer. “I thought you were exhausted, old man. Did you pop a Viagra?”

  “Very funny.” He undressed, slowly. His large chest was covered in ink, a barbell poking through one nipple. A piercing, like the one in his penis, that he’d done himself in a moment of despair. Rex soothed himself with pain, but since Nate and I had come into his life, he no longer needed to hurt himself. We’d found peace in our three-way love, all of us.

  He stood at the edge of the tub, and I took his thickness into my mouth, at least all of it that I could. King Rex was known for his enormous pierced cock.

  “God, Penny,” he moaned as I devoured him.

  “Not yet, I need to feel you,” he said, climbing into the tub behind me.

  “You two are my life, you saved me,” he said as his arms wrapped me, his lips buried in my hair.

  “I love you,” I gasped as his palms slid down my belly, down further, until his fingers were inside me, stroking, squeezing, and driving me to ecstasy.