Named Storm Ch. 02

Literotic asexstories – Named Storm Ch. 02 by thelastenglishking,thelastenglishking Last week’s Trade Show in Latvia turned into an emotional roller coaster. Not the business side of things, that went well, in fact brilliantly; but everything else associated with the trip had me bouncing up and down like a bloody Yo-yo!

Oops, I almost forgot; my name’s Ariana and I’m a Director, along with my father Jack and elder brother Jamil, of our family owned — possibly the largest in Europe? — plastic moulding company. That’s what the show in Latvia was for and though we’d staff running our stand, the three of us were on hand to schmooze our larger customers and make close-call decisions on any major negotiations.

Dad’s the technical genius, while Jamil deals with production operations and logistics and I’m the Sales and Marketing Director. I’ll concede that being the MD’s daughter is what got me the job in the first place, but my success is not just down to my short skirts and tight, low-cut blouses — though they definitely help – I’m damned good at my job too!

That’d been proved once again in Latvia; I’d managed to secure us more new contracts than we could possibly handle. But no worries, Jamil had signed some favourable contracts for the purchase of new equipment, while other than the dotting of I’s and the crossing a few T’s, Dad had agreed our takeover of a Spanish based competitor. We were now definitely Europe’s largest privately owned plastic engineering company!

Such success called for a major celebration and our staff were certainly going to enjoy one, but the three of us wouldn’t be able to join the party. Instead we were leaving before the show had even quite finished, rushing away to catch a Friday afternoon flight back home; it was my mother’s birthday, so her party would have to take precedence.

That was ‘The Plan’, but as with so many other plans related to our Latvia trip, it crashed and burned:

It had always been mum’s birthday today and the original intention had been that we would celebrate it here in Latvia. Mum and Jamil’s wife Priscilla would fly out with us on the Monday, spend their week shopping and doing the tourist-bit in Riga; then we’d have a whole weekend of birthday celebrations before flying home. Even my boyfriend Tom had been going to fly out and join us for the weekend.

That plan foundered when the show’s organisers sent us an email six weeks ago; there had been a major fire at the exhibition centre in Riga so the show was instead to be held in a town on the coast called Salacgriva. Having Googled the place, first mum and in her turn Priscilla, announced that they weren’t going and that we would have to be ‘home by Friday evening’.

My own disappointment on hearing this news was ameliorated by the questioningly raised eyebrow and wicked smile which Jamil surreptitiously directed toward me. Those lasted for only a moment, but were enough to raise my heart rate and trigger a flutter in my belly, which quickly spread to my groin; I could feel moisture dampen my panties.

Jamil is beautiful and I use that adjective rather than handsome intentionally. Jamil inherited far more of our mother’s Iranian genes than I did and looks every inch the Arab prince. Tall, slim and olive skinned, with both eyes and hair — he’s no shortage of the latter — a gleaming, obsidian-black; Jamil is blessed with an ethereal almost feminine beauty, which is perhaps why he gets almost as many men hitting on him as girls.

Growing up with Jamil for a brother was a pain in the arse; bad enough when we were at school, but it became far worse once I got to college. Although Jamil’s almost two years older than me, with the way that our birth dates fall, we were only ever separated by a single school year and while we took different courses, we both studied at Manchester University and shared an apartment nearby.

I rarely knew for sure whether someone was a genuine ‘friend’ or just angling for an introduction and to hopefully score a date with Jamil; by the end of my first year at Uni I was beginning to wonder whether I was Jamil’s sister or his pimp! One night, after drinking far too much, my frustration got the better of me and I very loudly and very crudely, told Jamil just that!

Jamil’s response floored me completely, thank God we were alone: After a few seconds silence Jamil burst out laughing and followed that by suggesting “You’re not really annoyed Ariana, or at least not in the way you used the word. It’s jealousy… You’re frustrated because I’m fucking your friends and classmates rather than you.”

I was absolutely gobsmacked; beyond speech, indeed I could barely draw breath. I felt my cheeks redden and heart begin to race, while trembling legs struggled to keep me upright. Jamil was silent too, simply smiling in just the way I’d seen him do with so many other girls; that was when the butterflies took flight in my belly, had that too happened to my friends?

Jamil stepped forward and caught me in his arms; my initial thought was that he did so to prevent me tumbling to the floor. That thought was short lived: While Jamil’s left arm wrapped around me, his right grasped my bum and pulled me in so close I could feel his cock press against my belly; Jamil then kissed me and not in a way that he’d ever done before.

In that moment I didn’t think… I was beyond thought! I just responded… Not like a sister, but in just the same way as all those other girls had; my arms clasped around Jamil’s neck and I kissed him back, hard, long and deep, my tongue was exploring Jamil’s mouth even before he’d explored mine. I have no idea how long our clinch lasted, but I can recall it’s ending.

Jamil’s left hand transferred from my shoulder to my right breast and when it closed around that soft orb, reality hit home with a bang. I pushed Jamil away and stepped back with a yelp, I was kissing my fucking brother! Things were now worse not better: The shortness of breath, racing heartbeat and trembling legs were still there, but those damned butterflies had now migrated to my groin.

As so often in the past, Jamil hit me with that beaming smile of his and held out a hand toward me as he spoke: “You know I’m right Ariana; you’ve been fantasising about my taking you to bed for months. We both know it’s going to happen at some point, so why don’t we make it sooner rather than later?”

My head swung from side to side in the negative, but I couldn’t get my lips to form the word ‘No’. “We… we can’t Jamil… It’s… It’s wrong.”

“It’s only wrong if someone says so and there’s only the two of us here; nobody else to see us and I’m never going to tell anyone… Or say it’s wrong.”

I didn’t answer that, or not verbally at least and was still shaking my head when I accepted Jamil’s proffered hand and allowed him to lead me towards his bedroom. While my thoughts were an utter jumble, I do recall thinking that Jamil hadn’t been entirely correct: It hadn’t been ‘for months’… I’d been dreaming about sleeping with Jamil for years.

I wasn’t some innocent virgin, far from it, but while Jamil gently peeled off my clothes, I had tears in my eyes and was trembling like a leaf; that reaction perhaps helped explain what followed. Jamil laid me on the bed and slowly removed his own clothes while I watched; I licked my lips unthinkingly when his cock appeared and that drew another smile from Jamil.

Jamil was equally unhurried once he’d joined me on the bed, not something I was used to with other boys; I’d guess that it was a half-hour at least before Jamil’s cock finally penetrated me. The intervening period having been swallowed up by Jamil’s lips, tongue, teeth and fingers caressing and arousing what felt to be every square inch of my body.

I’d orgasmed three times by then, but I suspect that Jamil’s teasing might well have lasted longer still had I not cried enough and begged him to fuck me. That saw yet another saucy smile appearing on Jamil’s lips; he’d got me — as always! – exactly where he wanted all the girls. Flat on my back, with legs splayed and pleading for his cock; Jamil is so damned annoying!

Jamil continued to be gentle and leisurely; this was love-making, not a quick shag; did he treat all the girls like this, or was he making a special effort for his trembling little sister? And believe me, I continued to tremble, though that was now down to desire and arousal rather than any fear or trepidation. I came twice more before Jamil finally climaxed.

I suspect Jamil would have pulled out before he did so, had I not wrapped my legs around his backside, locked my ankles and growled “I’m on the pill… Don’t you fucking dare.” And yes, that saw Jamil’s smart-arsed smile returning to his face once more as he pumped his cum into me.

That wasn’t the last time Jamil fucked me; it wasn’t even the last time he fucked me that night and our subsequent couplings were rather… livelier. I felt it was time to show Jamil just how grown up his little sister now was and had his cock inside my mouth the moment he rolled off me; once he was hard again — that didn’t take long! – I climbed on top and rode Jamil cow-girl to another shared climax.

We both — Jamil far more than me — continued dating… And screwing, other people, during that and the following college year, but we usually spent one or two nights together each week. Even during my final year, by when Jamil had graduated and returned home, he would find an excuse — music gigs were a favourite — two or three times each month, to visit Manchester and spend the night with me.

Discrete nights spent in each others beds became more irregular once we were both back home at Thorne Hall. Even more so as Jamil’s relationship with Priscilla moved from casual, to serious and since last year, marriage and his moving from the main house into a nearby cottage My own developing relationship with Tom has only exacerbated things.

We haven’t stopped fucking each other entirely, but it had been a long while since the last time we’d had a whole night together; just the two of us. That was what those exchanged glances signified; Latvia promised to provide us with four whole nights of fucking each others brains out… We’d only just arrived at our hotel when that plan too crashed and burned:

Most of us will at some time have arrived at hotel and thought ‘this doesn’t look as nice as it did in the brochure’; well this one didn’t even look to be the same hotel as the one shown in the photos. Nothing much matched beyond its signboard and things didn’t improve any once we were inside!

With mum’s prevarication we’d been late in confirming our reservation so hadn’t been able to secure three individual rooms and had instead booked their three-bedroomed ‘Presidential Suite’. This we discovered on arrival, was actually one large room containing three beds, each separated by flimsy curtains with a small bathroom in one corner; was it a hotel room or a public hospital ward?

Dad’s a heavy sleeper, so neither Jamil nor I had had any concerns about sharing a suite with dad, but this… Enquiries soon revealed that everywhere else in town was booked out, while the rooms that our staff had been allocated were even worse; we apologised to them for that and promised a cash bonus for their having to rough-it.

We too were going to have to do the same; thank God mum and Priss weren’t with us, they would both have had conniption fits! To be fair the place was spotlessly clean and the staff all friendly and helpful; I’ve spent nights in worse places. But any thoughts of getting it on with Jamil had now gone right out of the window; it was perhaps my frustration about that which had fired me up working the Trade Fair?

It was early on Friday morning that we got the first text messages from the airline; Jamil had phoned Priss who reported the weather was already wild at Thorne Hall and that the TV was forecasting it to get worse rather than better. Priss was also concerned about driving to the airport to collect us, but that was easily resolved; Tom has some huge four-wheel drive pick-up trucks, so I called him.

We did a little networking around the show while checking and re-checking on our flights home and by early afternoon had confirmation… We were stuck here until tomorrow. Getting another night in the hotel proved easy enough, though we never thought to enquire if there might now be alternative rooms; after which we phoned home once again.

Those calls weren’t too bad for Jamil or I, but as anticipated, mum went ballistic; I’m not sure how she could hold Dad responsible for the weather, nor how she expected that he might change it. With that call behind us we wrapped up at the show and arranged to join our staff for a celebratory dinner in the evening; the hotel did at least boast a decent restaurant and a lively bar.

It turned into quite a party and the booze flowed like water; to be fair, ignoring the delay to mum’s birthday dinner, we’d a lot to celebrate. The only fly in the ointment was the difficulty during dinner of ignoring mum’s phone calls. She seemed to be ringing dad every ten minutes to update him on the horrendous weather at home, but what could he do about it?

We phoned Priscilla and asked her to go over to the hall and calm mum down, but Priss was stranded by floodwater herself. In desperation I phoned Tom and pleaded with him to go instead; he didn’t sound too enamoured by the idea, but when I promised to make it worth his while in bed tomorrow night, he agreed. It must’ve worked, we didn’t hear from mum again.

By about eleven we were all tipsy to varying degrees; in fact a few of our party, including dad, were clearly blind drunk! Dad’s not generally a big drinker, so I suspect that the grief he’d been getting from mum over the phone and an expectation of receiving worse once we got home, might have contributed to his night’s consumption?

One of our own staff and the hotel’s night porter helped to manoeuvre dad into the elevator and from there to our suite. Once they’d dumped dad on his bed and left, it fell to Jamil and I to get his shoes and most of his clothes off before pulling the covers over him and retiring to our own beds; dad was snoring like a pig before I was even into mine.

It wasn’t just dad’s snoring which kept me awake, but it was that snoring which set my mind wandering along the track that it took. Dad was out for the count, absolutely wasted… A brass band wouldn’t wake him up again. I’d been hyped-up from my week’s sales success to begin with and this evening’s booze-up had only fueled that further; I was buzzing…. And horny!

I soon realised that the application of my own fingers, while clenching my teeth to hold the noise down was not going to cut the mustard tonight. But Jamil was only ten feet to the right of me and I surmised that dad to my left wouldn’t have woken even if a bomb went off; I slipped out of my bed – and out of my panties – then pushing the curtain aside, I slid quietly into Jamil’s bed.

When I climbed in beside him, Jamil too was asleep; but not for very long, Jamil woke with a start in the moment my hand wrapped around his cock. I pressed my other hand over Jamil’s mouth to quell his gasp, then withdrew it again to make the universal sign for silence. Jamil looked surprised, perhaps even shocked and he glanced sideways in the direction of our father’s bed.

Once reassured that dad was sound asleep, Jamil’s expression softened at much the same rate as that by which his cock was hardening; Jamil had definitely got with the programme by the time I slid off his pants. After repeating my shushing gesture, I climbed on top of Jamil, straddled his thighs and fed that gorgeous cock into my pussy.

Jamil’s cock penetrated easily and completely; it was time to stifle a carnal gasp and then moan of my own. Those efforts weren’t helped by Jamil peeling off the oversized t-shirt I was wearing and thereafter wrapping his lips around my left nipple, whilst teasing the other with his fingertips; maintaining silence became harder still when his teeth closed upon my nipple with just the degree of force that I like best.

I placed a hand on Jamil’s forehead and pressed him away before it all became too much; only when I’d recovered my composure did I begin to ride his cock. My motion was sedate, almost languid; I knew just how horny I was, but not Jamil and the last thing I needed right then was to have him blow his load too early.

I needn’t have worried, I’d brought myself to two nipple-tingling orgasms before Jamil climaxed. Jamil had clamped a hand firmly across my mouth during each of those climaxes and I repaid the favour in the moment just before his dam burst; I felt Jamil swell and shudder inside me, before I slumped atop him a few seconds later.

Not a word had passed between us and we remained silent during the minute or two that we then spent recovering ourselves. I’d achieved the orgasm that I’d craved and good sense said I should leave it at that, but dad was still snoring loudly. Rather than returning to my own bed, I slithered down Jamil’s until my face reached Jamil’s cock and I took it between my lips.

Jamil tried to push me away, but it was a half-hearted effort and undermined still further by Jamil raising his knees and parting his thighs to make my access easier. I love the feel and taste of Jamil’s cock inside my mouth, most especially when it’s flavoured with my own essences too; I lost myself in the pleasure and was still suckling on it five minutes later.

Jamil was just beginning to harden again, his hands toying with my hair in… Encouragement? But it was neither the stiffening of Jamil’s cock or his fingers suddenly tensing and clenching against my head which broke my rhythm, it was hearing the words “You look like you’re enjoying that.” I wasn’t sure if the words had been directed towards Jamil or myself, but I did recognise the voice; it was my fathers.

I was a second or so behind Jamil in freezing in place; did Jamil have the thought ‘Oh My God, No!’ blaring through his skull too? I felt a hand clasping onto each of my buttocks, they could only have been dad’s and they didn’t make me feel any better; neither did dad’s next comment: “I’d assumed that you two had stopped fucking each other since Jamil got married to Priss.”

That was another Oh My God! Moment; how long had dad known and who else knew? Jamil’s cock still between my lips provided ample excuse for my remaining silent, but Jamil was no more loquacious; never mind, dad was still in full flow:

“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, I’ve long suspected that Priscilla was probably like your mother, decorative enough, but no fire in her belly; lies flat on her back with her legs apart, but nothing more… Priss by name and prissy by nature’s my guess? Not like our Ariana here… She’s always been a little vixen…”

I was trembling like a leaf,, but beyond that I had lost the power of movement; Jamil was no better, I directed my eyes towards his face and found him wide-eyed and staring, his hands still clenched tightly in my hair. We remained that way even as I felt dad’s cock brushing against my thighs and heard him say “I’ll bet you can handle the both of us Ariana… And enjoy it too.”

An instant later accompanied by the sound of dad’s growled “Fuck me you’re dripping wet, has Jamil shot a load into you already?” I felt his cock slide easily into the depths of my pussy. I still didn’t, indeed couldn’t, voice a protest; far from it, dad’s penetration drew a guttural moan from my throat which spoke of nothing but welcome and assent.

Those guttural moans continued as dad’s cock repeatedly speared into me; I don’t know if it was the vibration from those moans flowing past Jamil’s cock or the sight of our father’s cock ploughing into my pussy that made the difference, but within a few seconds Jamil’s cock was fully erect once more and it began twitching inside my mouth.

I felt dad’s fingers briefly probe at my pussy too; a few seconds later he cried “You have! Ariana’s full of your cum Jamil, no wonder she’s so bloody slick… I’ll bet that you take in the arse though, don’t you Ariana; that’ll be a bit tighter.” Both Jamil and I froze once again on hearing that, our eyes met and this time I did see a response in Jamil’s; it was shock!

I don’t know what Jamil saw in mine, probably horror; I had never done anal… Not even for Jamil! That was an irrelevance now, during the few seconds that Jamil and I had wasted in exchanging those glances, dad’s cock slipped free of my pussy, his hand’s had roughly parted my buttocks and he now drove his cock hard and deep into my bottom.

My own and Jamil’s eyes were still locked together at the moment of intrusion, the force of which drove me forward, pressing Jamil’s cock deep into my throat; it was that second intrusion which choked off my squeal of denial. That scream emptied my lungs, so when dad eased back I had first to refill them and the sound of that perhaps resembled a groan of acceptance?

Whatever, I’d not managed to voice a word of objection before dad drove his cock into me for a second time. The effect of that on my ability to dissent was similar, as too was dad’s third penetration and by then it had become a moot point; the full length of my father’s cock was buried inside me and the violation which I’d feared for so long was complete.

There followed a short hiatus: Dad was on top of me muttering — I suspect to Jamil? – about how I was ‘a tight little bitch’ who ‘maybe hasn’t had as many cocks in there as I’d have guessed’. Jamil still looked horrified… He knew that there hadn’t been any! As for myself, I was contemplating the sensation of my bowel clenching and releasing around daddy’s cock… To my surprise, it was proving really rather nice.

In confirmation, I sent a cheeky smile in Jamil’s direction, then began stroking my tongue firmly around his swollen cock. As for dad, when I felt his cock easing back, I pushed my pelvis backwards to meet his next penetration on the way in… Fuck but that sent it deep! Jamil was slow to react, but dad certainly got the message. “You’re loving it, aren’t you… You sexy little slut.”

Dad had been right, I did ‘handle’ them both; my father and brother skewered me from opposite ends. To be honest, I expended far more of my effort and attention on daddy’s cock reaming my arse, than I did on Jamil’s. That didn’t much matter, I suspect Jamil was mainly getting off on watching our father boning me; Jamil was by far the first of us to climax.

In that moment I was too busy with my own moans of pleasure and voicing lurid words of encouragement to swallow Jamil’s load, especially with the amount that he let fly. Given that Jamil had already climaxed not half an hour ago, that did come as a surprise; My face and hair were covered in cum, to the extent I could feel it dripping off me onto the bed covers.

I was the next to succumb; God but I’d enjoyed it, why had I been so afraid of surrendering this final virginity? I was writhing and squealing my way through that orgasm when dad too let go; it was perhaps my frantic gyrations which in that moment dislodged him? His first stream flooded my bowel, but those that followed sprayed across my buttocks and back; I must have looked a sleazy sight?

The lull which followed, allowed us all to recover our sanities, each of us no doubt rationalising and dealing with what had transpired in their own way,.. Jesus Christ but it was outrageous; even I could see that. I took the easy way out: Slipping free from between dad and Jamil I headed into the bathroom muttering about my need to ‘clean myself up’. I was a mess, but that clean-up needn’t have taken me almost an hour.

When eventually I returned to the bedroom, it was to find that dad was back in his own bed and that both he and Jamil were sound asleep. Actually, I didn’t believe that for one second, but I and no doubt they too, preferred to go along with their charade. I must’ve lain awake, albeit also feigning sleep, for another hour before I slipped into the realm of Morpheus for real.

I woke just after seven, Jamil and dad were, or at least pretending to be, still fast asleep. I headed into the bathroom for another much needed shower; I’d been leaking through the night, perhaps dad had pumped more than one jet of semen into my bum? When I returned to the bedroom, swathed in a towel, dad at least was awake, though the expression on his face was alarming.

Dad appeared to have the weight of the world on his shoulders; remorse and self-loathing didn’t even begin to cover it. In that moment I began to appreciate just how much last night’s shenanigans had changed our relationship and with it came a realisation: Without immediate action from me, that change would be for the worse, perhaps permanently so.

I allowed a smile to spread across my face, the wild and wanton one which I knew both Tom and Jamil loved to see. A discrete tug and the towel fell away as I walked toward dad’s bed; his visage had softened and a smile was beginning to show on his lips by the time I yanked his bedcovers onto the floor. “Ooh Goody, you’re hard already dad… I won’t have to wait.”

The smile on my father’s face was full blown and as wicked as my own in the moment that I straddled his rigid cock, steered it between the soft folds of my labia and sank down to drive its full length into myself. We both released bestial growls as I descended, I’m not sure whose was the loudest or the most prurient.

I then began gently rocking on daddy’s lap; I didn’t want to disturb Jamil, assuming of course that he was actually asleep and not slyly watching, or at least listening, to our every move. Dad’s hands reached up towards my breasts; I swatted them away with a grin, then a moment later I leant forward, lowering my left nipple all the way to his mouth.

I remained in that position; sliding slid back and forth along dad’s thighs, grinding my clitoris against his fat cock while dad feasted on each of my breasts in turn. I was still doing so when I sensed the mattress sway and a moment later felt Jamil’s hands on my buttocks and heard him whisper “You can’t refuse me any more now Sis.”

I pulled away from dad for long enough to twist around and give Jamil the type of inviting kiss and smile that would leave him in no doubt that I wasn’t intending to. I was turned back around and delivering dad of a similar kiss by the time I felt Jamil’s cock probing against the rosebud of my bum; that kiss was disrupted by my lips opening wide to release primal groan as Jamil pressed himself into me.

Jamil’s intrusion took far longer and was more… controlled than dad’s had been, then again, with the added constriction of dad already inside me, it needed to be. Despite their being two cocks between my legs, Jamil’s penetration proved easier than last night’s had been too; was that due to my no longer being virgin or was Jamil more adept? I may have always denied Jamil, but I knew that not everyone had.

That double penetration provided me with the most salacious feeling of… fullness — is that a word? – that I’d ever experienced. It was just so outrageously sordid and obscene; the fact that it was Dad and Jamil who were wedged inside me only added to my scandalous pleasure. Our three way fuck, as had been the case with Jamil’s initial penetration, continued to be… Restrained and composed.

I supposed it couldn’t have been anything other, a wham-bang-thank-you-mam from either of them would have burst me wide open. Jamil continued to be the one who dictated proceedings; I did little more than snake and roil my hips in an effort to catch every available sensation, while dad lay virtually still beneath us both, contentedly muttering encouragements to his ‘sexy little whore’.

Only when our telephones all pinged together — it could only be the airline — did the pace increase and when it did, despite his being the one in control, it was again Jamil who climaxed first. Dad wasn’t far behind and I wondered if it was the sensation of Jamil’s come shooting into me that had tripped his switch? It was undoubtedly their twin emissions sluicing into me which triggered my own orgasm!

Jamil was the first to grab a phone and ten seconds later he cried “Shit! The plane’s going earlier than they said; we need to be at the airport in ninety minutes!”

That was perhaps for the best, it put paid to any post-coital discussion; I was back into the bathroom, flushing myself back and front within thirty seconds. A taxi had been ordered while I was in there and twenty minutes after that, we were on our way. Meaningful looks were exchanged during the journey, but the taxi driver was clearly fluent in English, so nothing was said.

Only after we’d found ourselves a discreet corner in the airport’s departure lounge was anything said and the course of that conversation was not what I’d expected; nor was dad being the one to start and indeed steer it:

“Well, this has proved to be a memorable week… As soon as we’re back to work on Monday, Ariana needs to begin organising for the Stuttgart Show; let’s make sure we’re in a decent hotel for that one.”

Jamil and I exchanged glances before Jamil replied. “But only yesterday we agreed, that as we’ve done such good business here, there’s no point in our making a big effort for Stuttgart. Maybe a small stand with a few staff, just for appearance’s sake and likewise you and I going for an odd day each; we’ll need to get the new Spanish operation fully functional before we can possibly take on any more work.”

“Who’s talking about work? I’m thinking that if you make sure Priscilla doesn’t come over… Farah’s no problem, she hates Stuttgart with a passion; we can spend four nights and half the day’s too fucking Ariana’s brains out.” That brought Jamil up short, his expression was a picture; I’m not sure whether it was what dad had said, or the satyric expression on dad’s face as he’d said it.

Jamil’s expression only softened when an equally wicked smile began spreading across my own face, in the moment before I crooned “Leave it with me dad; I know just the place… And don’t either of you say a word to Priss about Stuttgart; let me deal with her too.”