Booby Trapped and Baby Proofed by Imari Jade Read Free Book Online Page B

understood him. “No.”
    Harrison put his hands on his hips, flabbergasted. “Insubordination from the ranks will not be allowed.” And he thought Privates First Class where trouble. They had nothing on his surly two-year-old. “There will be no back talk, young man. If I say you’re getting a haircut, you’re getting a haircut.”
    Ethan shook his head. “No.” It came out very clearly.
    “You think you can manage a respectful no, sir or no, Daddy?”
    Ethan splashed water on him.
    Harrison wiped the water from his face with a towel, wondering if Ethan was too young for obedience class. Apparently he had hit the terrible twos hard and was embracing it. From what he had read, most kids eventually grew out of it. Harrison went back to washing Ethan. Once he was sufficiently clean, Harrison wrapped his stubborn son in a big bath towel and brought him back into the room to dress him. “Can you say daddy?”
    “No,” Ethan said again.
    Apparently, no was the new word in his baby vocabulary. Ethan had mastered it along with up, Bunny, and Roy, the name of his little friend at school.
    “Dad-dy,” Harrison said, annunciating the word so Ethan could repeat.
    Ethan just laughed and tried to grab Bunny while Harrison wrestled him into his clothes. After finally getting Ethan’s shoes on him, Harrison combed Ethan’s hair, trying to lay the curls down. It didn’t work. The curls just hung down to his neck. “That hair has got to go. You look like a girl. Calloway males look manly.”
    Ethan stared at him with the same color blue eyes as his. No doubt the little bugger was his.
    “We date beautiful woman and we grunt.” He grunted, inciting a new round of giggles from Ethan. He carried Ethan into his bedroom and let him watch some television while he showered and dressed. He found Ethan exactly where he left him, seated in the middle of the bed, but with Bunny, whom Harrison had intentionally left in Ethan’s room.
    He know knew that Ethan could get in and out of the bigger, higher bed without assistance. He smirked. The military needed shrewd minds like his.
     
    ****
     
    Harrison took Ethan to the day care center. He expected to see Angel, but was told by Ethan’s teacher that she had gone off to the educational store and would be back later. He waved goodbye to Ethan who was deep in baby conversation with the equally tall Roy. It might have just been his imagination, but Roy kept touching Ethan’s curls, and Ethan just blushed and let him without a fuss. Nope, those curls definitely had to go before his son grew up and discovered that he didn’t like girls. He’d still love him, but he wouldn’t be taking him to any military balls.
     
    ****
     
    Everett and Jeb arrived just before the contractors. While the hired help worked on the roof and the plumbing, he, Everett, and Jeb began painting the walls in the inside of the dojo. The dojo had an administrative office, a shower/locker room, an exercise room, two classrooms, and a big gym for demonstrations. With the three of them using electric sprayers, he figured they could have the entire place done in a couple of days.
    “How’s Trudy?” Harrison asked Jeb.
    “Missing Ethan,” Jeb answered when they had stopped for coffee around eleven.
    “If it’s any consolation, he’s giving me a dog’s life.”
    “What do you mean?” Everett asked.
    “He gets out of his bed and everything else I put him in. He fights me when I try to wash his hair, and he’s trying to put the moves on my girlfriend.”
    “What girlfriend?” Jeb asked.
    “Oh yeah. I forgot to tell you guys. I’m dating the neighbor lady.”
    “Ms. Robbins?” Jeb asked, sampling one of the homemade sugar cookies Trudy had sent over for them to munch on.
    Harrison nodded.
    “I thought you didn’t have time to date?” Everett asked, picking up a cookie.
    “Apparently my libido found time.”
    “Ooh, spill it,” Jeb said. “What’s it like to make it with a black