This is basically what I did. I ended up trapped in a half-management-but-no-real-authority-but-also-we-need-you-as-an-engineer role. It's an easy place to accidentally find yourself when the managers above you aren't technical enough to manage engineers effectively. All my previous jobs were in smaller companies where this tends to be the norm.

It has been incredibly freeing to work at GitLab where there is an engineering career path and no pressure to move into management. I don't think I'm a bad manager, but I don't enjoy it as much as engineering, and it's nice to just be able to do what I'm good at.