Romance tropes
Contract marriage romance
She signs to save the company. He signs to satisfy a will. Then the clauses start to slip.
A contract marriage romance begins with a document, not a declaration. The terms are clear. The year is fixed. The bedrooms are separate, at least on paper. What the contract cannot cover is what happens when two people have to live the bargain in public and keep their distance in private.
That is the engine of The Boardroom Vows. In Contract Bride, Cape Town founder Isla Adair has until Friday to find forty million rand. Investor Callum Rhys will save her company if she marries him for one year. The contract runs to forty-two pages. One rule sits at the centre of it: he will not touch her in private unless she asks.
In Contract Groom, engineer Marli Venter writes her own terms on a napkin. One year. Separate rooms. No lies. Ruan Rhys, the secret half-brother of Cape Town's most powerful family, adds a clause of his own: no pretending in private.
If you read contract marriage romance for the tension between what was signed and what cannot be bargained away, start with the two books already out, or read the opening of Contract Bride.