Chapter 8

I’d been home about an hour when Anna called. She didn’t sound anywhere near as happy as Phoebe did.

“Can I come over? Get a cup of coffee? I need someone to talk to.”

I agreed, wondering what made Anna sound so mixed up. It was nearly three in the afternoon, a little late for a coffee break but why not? I made a fresh pot of coffee and rummaged in the fridge for the cream. Normally when someone who can’t cook has an unexpected guest there’s a minute of panic. Thankfully I was sleeping with an amazing cook. The muffins from this morning would be perfect.

Anna rang my doorbell looking as sexy as she had the night before in her school girl skirt and cropped sweater. It helped that she was still wearing them.

“Uh, Anna? Your clothes?” I stammered a bit inarticulately.

“I know. That’s why I need to talk.” As she pushed by me and headed toward the couch I knew the artfully arranged muffins weren’t going to get much consideration. I swung the door shut and headed after her, taking the coffee. We might be in for a long talk.

“I haven’t been home yet.”

“Huh?” Yeah, that wasn’t the most helpful thing to say. I poured her a cup of coffee.

“Exactly. I spent the night with a guy.” Anna pressed her lips together looking pensive. “I went home from a bar with a guy. Actually, that’s not true, I went to his hotel and I didn’t leave until ten minutes ago.”

I nodded, not sure what to say. How do you respond when your very gay friend says that? Anna was living with another woman; she shouldn’t have been going to a hotel with a guy.

“I had sex with a guy. And I kissed a guy.” She thought about it for a minute. “I guess the last one goes without saying?”

“Yeah,” I agreed, then for lack of anything insightful or helpful I asked, “How’d you like it?”

“It was messier than sex with a girl.”

“Messy?” That threw me. My first sexual experience was disappointing and mildly painful; messy didn’t even come into it. “Oh shit, you weren’t safe! Anna!”

“Not the biggest problem, Mal, whatever disease I could catch is absolutely second to the fact that my life is falling apart here. I’ve always liked girls. Always. My first kiss when I was fourteen? Girl. My sleepovers in high school turned into steamy make out sessions. When I got my first modeling gig? I slept with my roommate, the one who was supposed to make sure no boys snuck into the place.” She threw up her hands, exasperated. “I don’t even look at guys that way, it’s not who I am. But for some reason last night…it’s like what I usually want didn’t matter.”

“And all you have to say about it is ‘it was messy’? Honestly that doesn’t sound like a hot night.”

“Oh I’m sure it was hot for people who are into that sort of thing…but I’m not.” Her hands were knotting up the edges of my throw blanket now, as confused as her voice. “I’m really and truly not.”

“But you were there.”

“You know the feeling you get in your stomach when you think about great sex? The butterflies-tickling-warm-wow, feeling? I don’t get that remembering last night.”

“But you liked it at the time.” I slid down on the couch and stared at my cup of coffee. “Even though you don’t like that sort of thing.”

“You see the problem.”

“I do. But can I point out a second problem?”

“Sure, anything to distract me.”

“Nancy.”

“Oh fuck.” Anna looked up with horror in her eyes. She dove for her purse, digging out the cell phone with lightning speed. A second later I was listening to her leave a frantic message.

“Hey honey! I got a little drunk last night and passed out on Mallory’s couch. I’m just now stumbling around…hope you aren’t out looking for me! Be home soon.” It was a cheerful-sounding lie and I immediately hated her for bringing me into it. The look must have showed on my face because she immediately started apologizing.

“I’m sorry, shit Mal, you don’t have to cover for me if she asks. I just…I just don’t know. I don’t know what to say to her because I don’t know what to say to myself. It’s completely unlike me. The whole night is this blur of me doing things I never do. Things I’d never want to do, but I did. I can’t figure out why I did it.”

“Could it be magic? A charm, a potion, something in your drink or on his skin?”

“No, I don’t feel any kind of magic hangover.”

“What about a drug? He got a little pushy for a second there. Maybe a roofie?” I tried to remember all the signs I’d learned in training. “Are you having trouble seeing? Do you feel like you’re going to puke?”

“No and no. Besides all my drinks were with you guys. If he was using magic to push me into drinking something else, the table would have felt it.”

“Well, okay, tell me about him. What do we know?”

“He works in fire protection, something about really hot chemical fires. Putting them out maybe?”

“You went home from a bar with a super-hot fireman?”

She nodded.

“Okay…what’s his name? Do you know his name?” I asked cautiously. Anna might be an assault victim. It might also be something else, but until I knew for sure, I wanted to be gentle.

“Aden. It’s like his great-grandmother’s last name or something? Anyway, it’s a family name. We talked about names a little after the first time.”

“After the first time?” A couple goes back to a hotel drunk from a bar there isn’t usually a second time.

“After the second time we slept, but after the third we ordered room service and talked until it came. The fourth, the fifth, no talking there.” Her voice kept getting higher, more frantic with each word. “Yeah, I really and truly screwed his brains out. Went through every position I’d ever heard of and made up some new ones. What am I going to do?”

I didn’t know. What do you do when you wake up one morning and you’ve done something completely unlike yourself? Do you try to understand why? What made someone do something they normally wouldn’t? We talked about it for a while and then Nancy called her back.

The conversation was short. Anna didn’t want to head to a hospital to get checked out when there was such a small chance they’d find anything. Not to mention the bigger chance that she’d have to come clean to Nancy. I could tell she didn’t like lying but no matter how much we talked, Anna still wasn’t okay with telling Nancy what had happened.

I found my way upstairs, bumping around in the darkness. My apartment came with state-of-the-art vampire shutters but the designer assumed it would only be lived in by vampires who could see in the dark better than I ever would.

“Careful.” Jakob’s voice came out of the darkness upstairs. “You’re inches away from the bed.”

“Humph,” was my less than articulate reply. I threw myself down on the bed when I came to it, content to be someplace where I couldn’t stub my toe. Lucky for me when I moved to Jakob’s place there was discreet floor lighting.

“You know I won’t have this problem when we move in together.”

“But you also won’t have Anna stopping by to tell you about her crazy nights,” he countered.

“Don’t believe it. The girls wouldn’t abandon me just because I move.”

“Hmm.” I could tell that hmm meant he was considering saying something but he wasn’t sure how. In the dark I could see his eyes but I couldn’t read his expression.

“Well?” I finally asked.

“Do women never tire of talking about sex?”

“Hmmm.” I thought it over for a long minute. “Pretty much, no.”

He rolled his eyes with a groan.

“Oh and we’re having dinner with Phoebe and her new boyfriend.”

His only response was a second groan.

Phoebe called around five, spending a good twenty minutes on the phone with Jakob. I did my best to appear disinterested when really the conversation, which focused on why she didn’t need to pick a restaurant he could eat at, fascinated me. I waited until he was done scribbling down directions to pounce on him.

“Are we going to talk about that before I move in or after?”

“Talk about what?” He feigned innocence.

“Your eating habits. Why you don’t eat in front of me when E says you used to eat in front of her.”

“Oh that.” His answer was a non-answer and I wanted more. We’d been sitting on the couch, lounging about with a copy of the paper I’d brought home for him, not really doing anything. It seemed the perfect time for a good long talk.

“Yes that. If we’re going to do this moving in together I think I should know.”

“All right.” He paused, his body tight beside me. “I don’t need to eat every day and I assumed you’d find it distasteful, so since I’d prefer you not think of me that way I’m happy to eat when you’re asleep.”

It wasn’t the answer I wanted. I suspected the “why” he didn’t eat in front of me had something to do with him feeling ashamed of being a vampire, or maybe he changed somehow, got violent or scary. I wanted to know but I was patient; we didn’t need to go into details the first time the subject came up in nine months. “What do you eat?”

“Deer.” He didn’t relax.

“Deer?”

“My property extends ten acres in any direction. I keep a small herd.”

“Always deer?”

“Well I did have some werewolf last summer but I was hoping that would be the exception.”

I shivered remembering the police photos of torn limbs and destroyed throats. He was capable of such great violence but instead fed on deer.

“Wow that’s”—I searched for the word—“noble.”

“Or weak.”

“Weak?”

“If I dined otherwise I would be stronger.”

“Human blood is stronger than animal?”

He nodded. “Yes, and the blood of a supernatural creature is stronger still.”

“Drinking my blood would make you stronger?”

“Drinking your blood would make me a monster.” I could see this was a battle he’d had before with himself.

“Nothing could make you a monster,” I said firmly. He frowned slightly, his lips tight in disagreement. “I mean it.”

“And that is why I love you so much.” His fingers played down my skin but I could feel him battling with himself.

“I love you, it doesn’t bother me.”

“It bothers me,” he replied. I kissed him hoping to wash the bitterness out of his mouth. “Your touch is powerful but it can’t change this.”

“No, but it can distract you for a little bit.” I smiled, undaunted as I lead him upstairs to the bedroom. Some designer long ago chose smooth mirror doors for my closet, creating a wall that reflected everything on the bed. I left Jakob there, watching the reflection, and put my back to the glass as I undressed him.

He stood still, motionless, letting me unbutton the shirt he’d put on a few hours before. I followed each button with a kiss, running my hands over his skin. His resolve broke when I got to the last button, the one low over his hips and I saw a smile begin to break through his seriousness.

“I know you don’t like talking about it, but I love you, not despite what you are, but because of what you are and how you act.” I undressed as I spoke, then moved close to him, pressing my naked body against his, feeling my hair on the bare skin of my back and the flat hard planes of his chest and stomach against me.

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” he said, trying to sound serious when already his hands were running through my hair.

“Then we won’t, not now anyway, but you need to know, you need to accept that you don’t have to hide from me.” I kissed the point home, letting my fingers move to his waistband, opening his jeans. The denim fabric fell to the floor with a soft noise. I reached down to find there was nothing else in my way. I gently massaged him, holding while I kissed his soft lips, feeling him grow hard. When he moaned, I stopped, pushing him back on the bed, leaving him sitting there. I stepped back to look at him, to take in his wonderful blond hair and all his marble pale skin. But I took too long admiring and he moved forward, his head against my belly, his kisses searching.

They found their mark. Those kisses made it hard for me to stand and his cool hands came up to support me. His tongue moved across my skin, making me burn with desire. I expected to seduce him. I wanted him to watch me take him in the mirrors. Instead it was all I could do to moan and beg for more while he licked. My body began to tense, pleasure turning into a pressure that defied meaning. I knew if I wanted to recapture the seduction I planned I needed to do it soon.

I pushed back from him, standing on legs weak with passion and he looked up at me a teasing smile on his lips.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“Never,” I breathed, before climbing onto the bed, sitting above him with my knees on either side of his body. He entered me slowly, easing himself into me until our bodies joined at the middle. After that any thought of going slowly left me. I slid up and down his firm flesh as his hands caught my hips, guiding me, changing my rhythm into a powerful dance.

The sensation came again, stronger, pleasure that would not be denied. Now I wasn’t thinking of him, wasn’t planning how it would look or trying to distract from some point; now I wanted it, I wanted to feel this way and I beat myself on him hungry for release. The pleasure grew in the core of my body, stealing my breath, but still I couldn’t stop moving. Then it happened, my muscles clenched, tightening around him, making me feel every inch of him before I exploded with release. His release joined mine a second later, our eyes locked together, our bodies as close as our souls.

****

I didn’t want to get out of bed. It was simple. Phoebe and her wonderful boyfriend would have to understand. We’d had a major breakthrough, I knew what Jakob ate and when. That was huge.

It deserved at least a few hours of wallowing under the covers, enjoying our new feeling of closeness. Unfortunately, Jakob thought once you were committed you were committed, such a quaint old-fashioned notion.

I watched him dress from the bed, still naked and wrapped in the sheet. He put on jeans that had never seen hard work but cupped his ass perfectly. A second later the pale marble perfection that was his chest disappeared into a black undershirt.

“You should be getting dressed.”

“Nope, I’m wallowing in our new-found closeness.”

“You’re what?” he asked from the closet.

“You heard me!” I shouted back, sure he could hear me. “I was worried about your eating habits; they were like this big bad thing that could cause problems, except it turns out they’re not and I’m basking in that feeling.”

“If you were so concerned why didn’t you ask me sooner?”

“Well, because…because I was worried about how it would turn out I guess.”

“Is there anything else that worries you?” He sat on the end of the bed buttoning up a navy-blue shirt. It didn’t exactly go with his eyes but it did wonderful things for his pale blond hair.

“Dozens of things,” I admitted.

“Why not ask me?”

“Well, because it could go bad.” Wasn’t that horribly obvious?

“You’d rather worry something will cause a problem than find out if it will and deal with it?”

“Exactly.” I was nodding my head in agreement when I realized his damnable logic had caught up with me. Again.

****

Phoebe met us inside the restaurant, her blonde hair and deep tan skin shining under the warm orange lights. Plants crowded the entrance space turning it into a palette of greens. A sign on the wall boasted that whenever possible food came from local farmers.

I shivered a bit in the cold January wind; if we were depending on local produce dinner would be rather scant. Phoebe didn’t seem to have any concerns, her green eyes lit up when she saw me.

“Ethan’s waiting at the table.” Every inch of her radiated delight. “My boyfriend, my nice normal boyfriend is waiting at the table.”

“I heard.” She didn’t notice me at all, but walked into the interior. The space was small, chopped up into little rooms, each one a different shade of sunny yellow or burnt orange. There was no art work on the walls but the plants continued, making the space seem outdoorsy and cramped at the same time. The effect worked for people, though; the place was filled with the scent of patchouli oil and warm bodies.

Dreadlocks and braless women adorned most of the tables, where patrons wore hemp clothing and minimalist shoes. As we sat down, I watched Jakob. His crisp buttoned shirt and short blond hair looked completely out of place in what had to be the town’s only hippie restaurant. The table was empty when we got there, but Phoebe didn’t seem to mind.

“How’d you find this place?” I asked as I read over the “Wholesome Harvest” menu. Phoebe might be a vegetarian but she didn’t usually take it this far.

“Ethan.” His name brought a dreamy look to her face.

“And when will we get to meet him?” I asked, but she didn’t answer, the man behind her did.

“Right now. Sorry, I had to step outside for a call.” My first impression was that he was short, short enough that Phoebe was almost taller than him. If she’d worn heels she’d definitely be taller. His hair cascaded down from his head in tight black ringlets, and a heavy shadow of the same black hair stood out around his mouth.

I could see Jakob looking at him, not approving at all of someone who didn’t shave before an evening out, but the look worked. The rugged, devil-may-care look went with the light in his hazel eyes and the casual way his grin stayed on his long face.

I could see why Phoebe liked him; he looked rakish, fun, the kind of guy who would take you hiking all day. The fact that he was wearing hiking boots with his jeans helped the image.

After Phoebe did the introductions Jakob started the conversation. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. We’ve heard such wonderful things about you from Phoebe.”

“It’s horrible the way she lies,” Ethan replied straight faced. Phoebe’s mouth fell open in shock and then, more surprisingly, she smacked his arm.

“Don’t listen to him Jakob, he’s just having trouble dating someone who’s not an earth witch.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yup, I’m his first normal girl,” Phoebe said with a grin. “Well, normal spirit witch.”

“Oh I wouldn’t call you normal, honey,” Ethan teased with an equally wide grin.

“Why date other earth witches?” There were no other death witches for me to date or even hang out with; I didn’t know if I would if there was. “I mean exclusively.”

“It’s easier.” He shrugged. “They understand things other people don’t.”

“Like what?” Okay maybe I should have let it go but I was curious.

“Well—” He looked around for a minute, his eyes finally settling on the candle on our table. “Take candlelight. Candles can be made with almost no negative impact. The bees that make the wax don’t have to be killed and the plants that make the wick don’t hurt anything. Everyone agrees candlelight is more romantic and prettier, but they insist we have brighter light. Thus, we get the incandescent bulb. It generates heat that’s wasted, its creation can do rotten things to the environment, and for a while there it took dead animals to create it. Why would anyone pick it over a candle?”

“I don’t know.” I’d never really thought of my light bulbs; if I flipped a switch and the light came on, I was good. “Maybe they’re easier? Or maybe they give a brighter light so I can stay up later?”

“But should you stay up later? What’s wrong with going to bed after sunset? I’m sure that’s what you did growing up, right Jakob?”

“Yes, but my work was much different then, there was nothing to be done after dark.”

“And there still isn’t. Don’t get me started on the environmental impact of televisions or the idea that if we don’t work into the night we’re somehow unfulfilled. Most Americans are sleep deprived, caffeinated zombies pushing themselves to do more, all so they can stay up to eleven watching the latest episode of whatever sitcom the media tells them to enjoy, when really they’d enjoy a good night’s sleep or a conversation with someone a lot more.”

I was about to defend my late-night TV watching practices when I realized that wasn’t what we were discussing. “How does any of that relate to only dating other earth witches?”

“Oh.” He had the decency to blush. “Sorry, I got off topic. I do that sometimes.”

Phoebe rolled her eyes at his “sometimes” but kept her mouth shut. “The point is: I light my house with candles. Earth witches don’t even blink when they see that, but other people think it makes me a zealot.”

“But you’re a cute zealot, so I forgive you,” Phoebe told him with a smile.

A young woman in a heavily embroidered peasant dress came by, her dreadlocked hair covered by a kerchief; it took me a minute to realize she was our waitress. When it was my turn I ordered a salad with free range, hormone free, grain fed chicken, wondering if I would be able to taste a difference. Predictably, Jakob ordered nothing. Ethan waited until the waitress left to talk about it.

“You don’t have to skip your meal for me. I’m an advocate of vampirism.” Everyone at the table looked at Ethan as if he’d grown a second head. It was rude of us, but you don’t throw something like that out there and expect people not to notice.

“Really?” Jakob asked his voice barely concealing his disdain. Ethan completely missed it.

“If you’re not going to be vegetarian it’s the best diet, karmically and environmentally anyway. Vampires don’t have to kill their meals, they can even keep them from feeling any pain. That’s a lot better than most factory-farmed chickens who live in squalor and are slaughtered without any regard for their feelings.”

“You’re the first person I’ve ever heard express that view.” Jakob’s strained smile was somewhere between indulgence and disbelief.

“Mind you I’m not saying we should all turn ourselves into vampires, but it’s not the worst option. It’s at least a thousand times better than eating fast food every night. What they do to cattle is—”

“Not polite dinner conversation,” Phoebe finished for him. “What’s going on at work, Mal?”

“We’re investigating a murder case that’s not going anywhere and this morning during a run I stumbled onto a half-dead body. You know, same old same old,” I joked.

“Walter Lloyd?” Ethan asked with a smile.

“Excuse me?”

“Representative Lloyd, Concordia Parish, he was found this morning at Rivermont Park, multiple stab wounds.” He described the case.

“You knew him?”

“I’m an environmental lobbyist. I’ve been fighting against him for years.”

“Against him? I guess you’re not upset he was attacked.” Really, I didn’t need to say it; his upbeat tone answered the question for me.

“Not at all, it’s a victory for the cypress trees. He was a strong supporter of industries that cut them down to make mulch.”

“Doesn’t mulch cut down on the amount of watering people have to do? Isn’t that a good thing?” I asked.

“Sure, but not when you’re cutting down trees that remove pollutants from the environment, are decades old, and can’t be replaced. Not to mention he killed a bill to require loggers to replant. Honestly, Lloyd’s got his face on a wanted poster in my office.”

“I understood Representative Lloyd stood firm on most environmental issues,” Jakob said, surprising me. I had no idea he followed politics. “I’ve had him consult on projects in the past; he always seemed to favor an environmentalist view.”

“Not enough.” Ethan sounded almost angry. “He’s one of those ‘approve a tax break for electric cars and call it a good day’ types. We deal with them all the time. They think doing some little thing to encourage environmentalism is enough when really they should be mandating it. People won’t act unless they’re forced to and that’s what our leaders should be doing. If Lloyd is out of office maybe we can get someone in who will.”

I swallowed hard. Ethan seemed like a nice guy but most people had the decency not to speak ill of someone who was a victim of violent crime. I was glad when the waitress interrupted us; I didn’t know what else to say. Thankfully after our plates were set down, Phoebe steered the conversation to travel.

Ethan had been to Africa, and his travel stories lead to Phoebe’s funny stories from work, which eventually got Jakob to open up about his work issues with foreign economies. Dinner was over before I realized it and we all walked out of the restaurant relaxed. Ethan slipped his arm around Phoebe’s shoulders and I could see she was in heaven.

“When you’re not saving the environment you hike, go mountain biking, and rock climb.” I shook my head at Ethan’s life style. “Are you sure you can keep up with that, Phoebe?”

“I can try.” She laughed. “Don’t worry, there are a few sports I’m the expert in.”

Ethan’s blush told me the sport she was talking about usually took place on a horizontal court and might have explained why they hadn’t slept together. I was almost sorry we didn’t have more time to talk. Almost, but not quite; walking next to him something about Jakob’s body language seemed forced.

“Is that your car?” Ethan said. We’d made it to the parking lot and standing in front of us was the world’s most perfect vehicle.

Oh yes, she’s mine, I thought. My perfect wonderful Jeep, Lara, the special edition won in a raffle, a gift from all the gods above. I liked my car, a lot.

“Yes,” I said out loud, happy to contain myself in front of him.

“Careful, sweetheart, Mallory is completely in love with her car. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out she sacrificed small animals to get it,” Phoebe teased.

“Shows what you know, no one was harmed in the winning of my Jeep.” I grinned as Jakob opened the door for me with a smile of his own. There was something magical about a man who could appreciate the way a girl loved her car. I was going to have to show him how much I appreciated him tonight.

****

“Are you all right?” I asked Jakob after fifteen minutes of silent driving.

“No.”

Actually, I guessed as much or I wouldn’t have asked. “Is this about the advocate for vampirism thing?”

“Yes.” Another one-word answer. This wasn’t looking good.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“What is there to say? The man’s a fool.”

“Or he’s never met a vampire before. On paper his argument is sound; it only falls apart in real life.”

Jakob’s laugh was more of an angry bark. “Most vampires don’t have enough self-control not to kill their prey. Not because they aren’t old enough or strong enough but because they want to kill it. We’re not just people who happen to drink blood.” He stared through Lara’s plastic window fuming. “He’s a fool.”

I shivered remembering the one time I had seen a vampire feed. It wasn’t Jakob or Mark but a merciless killer the SIU put down as he devoured his victim. He’d enjoyed it. Worse, trying to control him I called the magic, and when the victim died it brought a rush of magical power.

“My love?” Jakob broke into my memories of the case.

“I was remembering a case, it was a…you know it was months ago, you probably don’t remember.”

“I remember. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to dredge up painful memories.”

It was my turn to laugh in a cynical way. “They aren’t painful, love, they’re exciting, enticing. I enjoyed watching someone die. I’m sick that way.”

“You never told me that.”

“It’s a pretty shameful secret to have.”

“No, it’s who you are. Death witches are strongest when death is present. Why wouldn’t you enjoy it?”

“Because it’s twisted and wrong?” I pulled into his driveway, stunned I had to argue this with him.

“No, it’s part of you, you have to accept it or it will drive you mad.”

“How can I accept that the things that make everyone else turn away make me high?” I gave up trying to talk about it in general and brought up an obvious and painful example. “The magic can feel so good but that means someone’s dying…” I shivered remembering all the times I’d enjoyed it; it felt better than anything else, a perfect natural high, magic singing through my body. “It’s weird and wrong, and I don’t know how to handle it.”

I turned off the car and stared straight ahead. Any minute now Jakob would try to convince me I was perfectly normal. That it was perfectly normal to feel the things I did, to do the things I could. It would be lies, comforting words but lies all the same. I waited for him to speak but instead he got out of the car.

He opened the door for me and led me inside the house, out of the cold night air. He didn’t stop until we were in the living room in front of the fireplace. I wasn’t sorry it was unlit. This wasn’t a moment for romance.

“It may be wrong, it may be distasteful, but this I know, my love. If you don’t accept who you are and what you enjoy you’ll tear yourself in two. You can’t loathe yourself and live your life. I know, I’ve tried.” His voice filled with pain and he kissed me gently. “You have to accept yourself. You have to see that no matter how the world views it, it’s who you are.”

“I know, it’s just that…” What should I tell him? How honest could I be here? Oh to hell with it, we were sleeping together, he’d asked me to move in, might as well tell him everything. “I liked it enough that I dream about it. That I want it. No, that’s not true. I don’t want to watch someone else kill; I want to use magic to pull people toward death, I want to take them. I want to feel the magic.”

I couldn’t look at him. I had to face the floor. “I could see myself giving in to it, doing it, turning into the kind of person I hunt every day. It wouldn’t be hard to just give in.”

“But you won’t and that’s what saves you.” He held me close, our bodies pressed together, held me despite what I’d just told him, despite what I wanted.