The Partner Plot by Kristina Forest

Welcome Back, Booklovers! The Partner Plot is the second book in the Greene sisters series by Kristina Forest and one that I was seeing splashed across my social media a lot in February so once my library hold came through for the audiobook I decided it was finally time to read. 

Violet Green is a celebrity stylist whose career is fast rising thanks to her largest client Caramel Kitty. However her personal life is a mess having dumped her fiancé months ago and he ran off with one of her clients. While in Vegas celebrating with Caramel Kitty, she runs into her high school sweetheart Xavier Wright, who is there with a friend. After club hopping, and several drinks later Violent and Xavier wake up in bed together. They quickly realize they didn't actually marry and instead signed up for the fake package and part ways. When Violet lands a big interview with a magazine, the interviewer starts asking questions about her love life and in an effort to redirect attention back to herself she what starts out as a small lie becomes more complicated. She and Xavier find themselves in each other's lives again and the old feelings that never died come to the surface.

The book starts off with a very YAish prologue recapping how they met, started dating, and broke up during high school before parting ways. I don't think hinging a second chance romance on a finnicky high school relationship worked in the book's favor. With both having been in relationships with other people there's little reason for them to still be holding onto each other as the one that got away. And adult Violet and Xavier have very little in common in both their personal and professional lives.

There was a lot of opportunity here with Violet having a career most people can only dream of to have a fish out of water story with Xavier having to adjust especially since he felt inadequate since she had her life more together than he did. But they end of spending the majority of their time together in the small town Violet ran away from.

It was also pretty long in length for a contemporary romance, particularly one that doesn't do anything new or exciting with the tropes it uses. There was a point where it felt like the book could've ended but instead kept going with minimal drama. The audiobook narrators were good and kept me reading managing to add some life into the story. There were attempts to add more depth to the characters by including Violet's drama with her mother and Xavier's career woes but more could've been done to beef those plots up.