The Dragon's Bride (A Deal With a Demon, #1)

This paranormal romance is set in a demon realm divided into territories ruled by different species. The story alternates between the perspectives of Briar, a human domestic abuse survivor, and Sol, a dragon territory leader, as they enter an arranged marriage neither expected to become real.

Briar is hiding in a hotel room, battered and concussed, when she agrees to sign a contract with Azazel, a bargainer demon who can cross between the human and demon realms. Three days earlier, Azazel approached her with the offer, and she refused, determined to escape her violent husband Ethan on her own. Since then, Ethan tracked her credit card to the hotel and beat her so badly that only a stranger's intervention saved her life. Now desperate, Briar reviews the terms: seven years of service in the demon realm, during which she will not be forced to do anything against her will but must give the person of Azazel's choosing the opportunity to seduce her. Any child born during the contract will remain in the demon realm. Azazel explains that time moves differently between realms and that the magic there slows aging. Briar signs. Azazel vanishes and returns with blood on his hands, confirming he has killed Ethan. Briar faints from shock.

She wakes in the demon realm, her injuries healed. Azazel now appears in his true form, a massive, crimson-skinned demon with large horns. She dons a white dress from a provided wardrobe and joins four other human women in a dimly lit room, where Azazel announces that selections will be made. The perspective shifts to Sol, the dragon leader of one of the realm's territories. He explains that bargainer demons are the only species able to cross into the human realm. Generations ago, interbreeding with humans strengthened each territory's magic, but since the realms closed, successive generations have grown weaker. A human bride is essential for revitalizing this power. The territory leaders call out dress colors to claim their brides. Sol chooses white, claiming Briar.

In a private room, Briar sees Sol for the first time: a towering dragon man over seven feet tall, covered in green scales, with short horns and a humanoid torso. Azazel explains that dragon culture requires them to marry for the duration of Briar's contract. When Briar objects that she is already married, Azazel reminds her she is now a widow. She signs the marriage contract with dread. A translation spell tattooed onto her shoulder blade automatically translates all spoken language, and Sol warns Briar that the contract will forfeit his entire territory if he harms her. He leads her through a portal to his domain, a stone keep surrounded by forest. At a sacred spring, they perform the marriage ceremony by entering the water separately and emerging together.

Sol gives Briar his own bedroom and avoids her for three days. Aldis, Sol's brown-scaled dragon cousin and the keep's scribe, delivers food and clothing. On the third day, Ramanu, Azazel's eyeless, horned emissary, arrives for a check-in. They mock Sol for neglecting his bride, lead Briar to the keep's massive library, and provoke Sol into a territorial display before leaving with a warning that neglect constitutes harm under the contract. Left alone, Briar asks Sol how sex between them would work. Sol responds with deliberately graphic language meant to push her into safer emotional territory. Briar flees but returns to the bedroom and masturbates to the fantasy of his words, experiencing pleasure without shame for the first time.

Sol, who scented her arousal from outside the door, resolves to stop avoiding Briar. Over dinner in the keep's bioluminescent garden, he reveals the full stakes: The realm's magic is tied to its territory leaders, and without human bloodlines, the soil's fertility will fail within a generation or two, causing famine. A half-human child would reinvigorate the territory as the next leader. Briar refuses to bear a child she must abandon when the contract ends. Sol does not press her. Instead, he gives her a magical contraceptive pendant that prevents pregnancy when activated monthly with drops of her blood. Emboldened, Briar suggests they consummate the marriage. Their first encounter is intense, with Sol prioritizing her pleasure with a patience she has never known. Afterward, Briar asks for exclusivity, and Sol promises there will be no one else.

Over the following weeks, a domestic routine develops. Sol arranges a reading translation spell so Briar can enjoy the library. When Ramanu tattoos the new spell onto Briar's shoulder using their own blood, the sight of another demon marking her triggers Sol's mating frenzy, a dragon biological response to new marriage that heightens possessiveness and territoriality. Briar finds his response arousing rather than frightening and deliberately provokes him. Their days settle into a comfortable pattern: Briar reads beside Sol while he handles territory paperwork, his tail curled around her, and she begins learning the dragon language directly from him. Despite growing happiness, Briar still has nightmares about Ethan and exhibits trauma responses. Sol reassures her that rest and healing carry no shame. At the one-month mark, she privately acknowledges deepening feelings for Sol but dreads the contract's end.

Sol takes Briar to a secluded lake in the forest and teaches her to swim. He recognizes he has fallen in love but fears saying so will pressure her. As they prepare to leave, Briar tells him to chase her and runs into the trees. Sol pursues. When he catches her, his teeth snag the pendant's cord. He pauses, waiting for her to refuse. She does not. He snaps the cord, and they have unprotected sex. Afterward, Sol is consumed by guilt and rushes to contact Azazel for a replacement. Before the couple can talk, Azazel appears and interprets the pendant's removal as a contract violation. Despite Briar's protests that she consented and the contract's magic did not flag the incident, Azazel teleports her back to bargainer territory.

Briar rages at Azazel, physically launching herself at him. Ramanu intercepts, activates a replacement pendant with Briar's blood, and sedates her when she tries to leave. Sol makes the normally five-day journey in three, arriving at Azazel's castle exhausted. He confronts Azazel with a realization: The demon never intended to seize the other territories but designed the threat of forfeiture to enforce good behavior. Azazel confirms he wants lasting peace. Briar then enters the study, composed and determined. She argues that since the contract's magic did not flag the incident, the pendant has been replaced, and she is not pregnant, no harm was done by Azazel's own logic. Azazel relents. Briar presses further, and Azazel reveals that at the end of seven years, contracted humans may choose to return to the human realm or stay.

Back at the keep, Briar and Sol talk openly. Sol confesses that his deeper fear was never the pendant but losing her, that every second of their seven years feels like time slipping away. Briar tells Sol she loves him and asks to stay permanently. Sol returns her declaration. Briar says she eventually wants children with him but needs more time to heal first. Sol agrees. Briar wants to be a full partner in governing the territory, and Sol warns that some dragons will not accept her, though most will be welcoming. She embraces Sol, marveling that she has found herself in a fairy tale with her own dragon.