Home Advantage

Elliot Mercer has built his life on control.
Distance, discretion, and precision have kept him safe—on screen and off. As one of the most recognizable actors in the world, he understands visibility as something to be managed, never trusted.

Mathieu de Montreval knows visibility differently. A French rugby star long accustomed to public scrutiny, he has learned that honesty costs less than hiding. He has survived being seen. What he has never learned is how to keep something real once it starts to matter.

Their connection begins quietly, in moments that aren’t meant to change anything. It doesn’t stay that way.

Ireland should be neutral ground: a wedding, a season unfolding, familiar rituals and borrowed time. Instead, it becomes a pressure point. Public attention sharpens. Narratives form without permission. What belongs to them privately begins to slip into view, examined and interpreted by a world that assumes access.

As proximity turns into intimacy, both men are forced to confront the lives they’ve built—and what those lives will allow. Loving each other means negotiating fame, expectation, and the fear of being claimed by a story neither of them fully controls. Some choices offer shelter. Others demand courage.

Home Advantage is a slow-burn, emotionally intimate romance about visibility, masculinity, and the cost of choosing love in public. Set against the elite world of international rugby and global celebrity, it explores mental health, identity, and the quiet, radical act of standing your ground when the safest option is retreat.