Me, I’m just a simple guy living the simple life in Mulligan’s Mill. I run the hardware store. I fix what’s broken. I’m a doer, not a talker, I just keep the cogs of Mulligan’s Mill turning. No one here suspects I’m gay—least of all that I’ve been quietly in love with Dean Reeves for years.
He’s my best friend’s son. I watched him grow up gentle and gifted, always strumming something on his guitar, lost in his music. But when he turned eighteen—when he stepped out of his little music studio in Andy’s backyard, taller, broader, with something magnetic about...
HARRY
Me, I’m just a simple guy living the simple life in Mulligan’s Mill. I run the hardware store. I fix what’s broken. I’m a doer, not a talker, I just keep the cogs of Mulligan’s Mill turning. No one here suspects I’m gay—least of all that I’ve been quietly in love with Dean Reeves for years.
He’s my best friend’s son. I watched him grow up gentle and gifted, always strumming something on his guitar, lost in his music. But when he turned eighteen—when he stepped out of his little music studio in Andy’s backyard, taller, broader, with something magnetic about him—needless to say I haven’t been able to unsee it since.
Now he’s a real-life rock star, and he’s coming back to town for a break. Just for a while, he says.
And I’m trying real hard to act normal. But it’s getting harder by the day… and so am I.
DEAN
I tell everyone I just need a break from L.A.—the noise, the pressure, the weird messages from that stalker who won’t leave me alone. And yeah, that’s part of it. But the truth? The real reason I’m going back to Mulligan’s Mill?
Harry Dalton… my dad’s best friend.
He was always there when I was growing up—the big, bear of a guy at the hardware store with those kind eyes and that quiet strength. But after I turned eighteen, something shifted. I started noticing the way his forearms flexed when he lifted lumber, the way his laugh rumbled low in his chest. And then I couldn’t stop noticing.
I’ve been trying to convince myself it’s just a crush. That he’d never look twice at a kid like me, especially now that fame and fortune have left their dirty marks on me. But I still can’t stop thinking about him.
Coming home is supposed to be temporary. A reset. But if Harry looks at me like I’m not just some kid with a guitar… I don’t think I’ll ever want to leave again.
The Heartstrings of Harry is the fifth book in Small Town MM Romance series Mulligan’s Mill… a small town with the biggest of hearts!
