Epilogue
Gwen
Nine months later…
“H ey, babe?” I called, walking in the back door, Fiona hot on my heels. “Is it on yet?”
“Just a few more minutes,” Truett replied from the other side of the room.
“FeFe,” Nate called, immediately dropping to all fours and patting the wooden floor.
Truett let out a grumble. “Can we not make FeFe a thing? It’s bad enough your mom puts her in dresses.”
When we’d gone looking for a dog to surprise Nate with for his birthday, Truett’s only request had been that we didn’t get a small dog. But one look at the sweet face of a four-year-old, five-pound Chihuahua mix and the tag on her kennel that read: Fiona, and I knew it was a sign.
She’d been surrendered after her owner passed away and came with an entire itty-bitty wardrobe. That crazy dog would tap dance beside her box of clothes, begging to get dressed, sometimes refusing to go outside without them.
Much to Nate’s dismay, Fiona had claimed Truett as her person, preferring him to either of us. It always made me laugh when we’d take her out in public. Truett, the world’s toughest and sexiest biker, toting around his pretty, pretty princess.
Right on cue, Fiona jumped on his legs, vying for attention, and he mindlessly scooped her into his lap.
“Traitor,” Nate whispered at Fiona as she wallowed on Truett’s chest. My son stood up and asked, “Can I walk to The Haven?”
Just days after the soft opening of The Haven, Truett had checked himself into a residential treatment program and spent nine agonizing weeks away. While we’d missed each other like crazy, neither of us could deny that those two-plus months had brought us closer together. During that time, we were forced to do the one thing we’d never done after his deployment.
We talked.
Laughing, crying, getting to know each other again, and rekindling the connection that had almost been lost, we spent hours each night on the phone. Every conversation made us stronger and healed wounds neither of us had realized we still carried.
I visited him when I could. It was a long drive, and between my commitments at The Haven and my time with Nate, those trips were few and far between. But when we did see each other, it fueled our souls, reminding us what we were fighting for and renewing the hope that had been lost so long ago.
During one of those visits, we made the decision for him to move in with me when he returned. We discussed it with an attorney to make sure it wouldn’t break any rules in my custody agreement, and then we talked it over with Nate. It was Truett who insisted that my son be completely at ease with the idea before we made any moves. Not only was he okay with Truett moving in, but he was completely thrilled about the idea. His first request was a spicy food competition, the loser having to cross-stitch a picture of the winner’s choice. I grinned the entire time as Truett sweated through the ghost pepper potato chips and proudly displayed the awful needlepoint he’d made after losing that read Have a nice poop over the guest bathroom toilet.
As we expected, Jeff was a prick of epic proportions when he was informed of our new living arrangements. However, after the dressing down Judge Clavet had given him the last time he’d tried to pull a fast one, he never once mentioned taking me back to court.
When Truett finally came home, I spent the first night marveling at the peace I felt with him by my side. He was still very much the man I’d fallen in love with—not just as a na?ve girl, but years later as a weathered woman. The difference in his eyes was immense, as if a weight had finally been lifted. Those nine weeks had changed him—not yet healed, but healing.
Truett’s courage and dedication to working on himself inspired me to do the same. I started going to individual therapy again to work through my own issues. But it wasn’t enough for us to only heal separately—we needed to heal together.
Couples therapy had been challenging, forcing us to confront the parts of our relationship we had avoided for so many years. Some days, it felt like we were making no progress at all, maybe even slipping further away, but we kept fighting. The past—our past—wasn’t something that could be fixed overnight. We both knew it would be a journey that would consume us for the rest of our lives, but we were committed to doing it together.
“Mom?” Nate whined. “Please, can I go? This place is boring now that you got rid of all the cool stuff.”
I glanced around the empty living room. The only things that remained were a few stray boxes, the chair Truett was sitting in, and a TV leaned against the wall. We hadn’t just gotten rid of the cool stuff. We’d gotten rid of almost everything. A week after Truett came home, we started cleaning out his house. It had been a slow and often grueling process. There were times he could only manage to part with a single item of clothing or a forgotten piece of furniture. Other times, he tackled entire rooms, stripping them of the memories that had once held him captive. Every item we discarded felt like a massive victory and a step closer to freedom.
Truett made the decision to donate the house to a charity that helped homeless veterans get back on their feet. He came to me with the idea after one particularly difficult day while cleaning Kaitlyn’s bedroom. It just felt right. In a true full-circle moment, the house that had seen so much pain would now be a place of healing for others.
“Please,” Nate begged. “I’m starving.”
Truett smirked over his shoulder. “Wait, I thought you wanted to go because you were bored?”
Nate crinkled his nose. “Yeah, it’s the worst. I’m bored and starving at the same time.”
Truett chuckled, his large hand still stroking Fiona’s soft fur. “Bud, if you want to go hang out with Cooter, you can just say that.”
Nate nodded enthusiastically. “Yes! She’s going to let me wipe down the tables today!”
I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t make the kid put his plates in the dishwasher, but somehow Lucille had him bussing tables and sweeping floors.
The Haven had officially opened the day following our soft launch, and we were almost immediately overwhelmed with business. Everything I’d worked so hard to accomplish had come to fruition, and the pride and satisfaction I felt every time I walked through those doors never got old. Lucille had been spot-on with the staff she’d helped me hire. She’d told me repeatedly that she had no interest in management, but she ran the entire show with ease and expertise. My menu was a hit, the local farmers providing the produce that I dreamed of, which left customers returning time and time again.
It wasn’t all smooth sailing—there were bumps along the way and a steep learning curve—but The Haven was there to stay. Truett and I had already started dreaming of future locations.
My son bounced on his toes, patience not something he was familiar with. “She’s already waiting for me halfway. So can I go? Please. Please. Please.”
“Fine,” I relented, stabbing a finger in his direction. “But I don’t care what she says. You are not allowed to cook anything again.”
He groaned in protest as he bolted through the door, bounding down the front steps. I followed, watching as he raced up the sidewalk to where Lucille stood grinning at the end of the block. We exchanged a wave as he reached her, and when they turned toward the restaurant, I went back inside.
Truett was still sitting in the lone wooden chair, staring at the TV, and I couldn’t tell if he was nervous or just lost in thought. Either way, we were alone, and I never missed a chance to steal a kiss.
I walked over to him and aimed my words at the dog. “Ms. Fiona, any chance I can borrow my husband for a while? You’ve been hogging him long enough.”
Truett laughed and immediately set her on the floor. She was none too happy about it and yipped at his feet, but I slipped onto his lap without a trace of guilt.
Three months earlier, while we were cuddled on the back porch, watching Fiona chase frogs, Truett had proposed. The night was cool, the moon high among the stars. He’d been off for a few days, and I could tell something was on his mind. A million possibilities ran through my head, but a ring wasn’t one of them.
We hadn’t discussed getting remarried yet, but it seemed Truett had been planning it for a while. As he got down on one knee, making promises to love me the way I had always deserved, he lifted a custom-made ring in my direction.
To say it was gorgeous would be an understatement, and not just because of the design. The thought he’d put into every detail made it absolutely stunning. I hadn’t known that he’d kept my old rings, the ones I’d dropped at his feet the day of Kaitlyn’s funeral.
He’d had the gold melted down to make a new three-stone setting. In the center was an emerald-cut diamond that he said represented our future. It was clear, flawless, and filled with promise. Flanked on either side were symbols of our past and present: Kaitlyn’s and Nate’s birthstones. Our entire lives wrapped into one stunning, never-ending circle.
There was never a doubt that I’d say yes.
Within a month, we’d tied the knot in a small, intimate ceremony at The Haven, surrounded by love, laughter, and the people who mattered most to us. And yes, even Dinky was in attendance. The Haven had become the symbol of a fresh start for me, and nothing made me happier than to say I do there.
“It’s time,” Truett whispered, his warm hand moving from my thigh to grab the remote.
I shifted on his lap, trying to get a better read on his face.
We were turning the keys over to charity the next day, so it felt right to watch the documentary in his house—a final act of closure we both not only needed but deserved.
“Are you okay?” I whispered, framing his strong jaw in my palms.
“Baby, you’re sitting on my lap, and when this is over, we get to grab Nate, go home, crawl into bed together, and move into the future together. So yeah, I’d say I’m pretty damn okay.”
My voice hitched. “You’re an incredible man, you know that, right?”
“I don’t know about that.” His lips curled into a gentle smile. “But we do make one hell of a team.”
Taggart Folly hadn’t stopped harassing us until we were finally granted restraining orders against him. We’d hoped that it would be the end of his little project, but not long after he left town, we got word from our attorney that he was moving forward with a film he’d titled The Massacre at Watersedge . It was a punch in the gut, and we’d used every resource we could to fight it, but ultimately, there was nothing we could do to stop him from releasing what was surely going to be a sensationalized version of such a horrible tragedy.
But there wasn’t a chance in hell we were going to let him have the last word. Truett and I might not have been able to control his narrative or how he portrayed the events of that day, but we had something Taggart Folly didn’t.
We had the truth.
The second Truett decided that it was time to tell his side of the story, he made it clear that there would be no documentary about the shooting at The Watersedge Mall. The maniac who had ruined countless lives didn’t deserve one single second of fame or notoriety.
However, the survivors did.
Each and every one of them deserved a voice—a testimony of their strength and resilience. Truett wasn’t the only hero in the mall that day. There were dozens of stories of strangers banding together, putting their own lives at risk for one another. Even those who hadn’t been able to be a hero for anyone other than themselves faced a different kind of hell on Earth in the aftermath of an event like that. Those were the people who deserved a platform.
With zero connections other than his name and the lore behind it, Truett was able to find a producer we felt we could trust in less than a week. Together, we focused on making a documentary with the survivors who were ready to have their stories told, never once bombarding those who weren’t.
When word got out that the mysterious Truett West was involved in the project, it took on a life of its own. So many people came forward with experiences they’d never felt comfortable sharing before. Even billionaire and public figure Caven Hunt and his wife broke their silence for the first time, knowing Truett would never allow their story to be treated with anything other than respect.
By the time it was all said and done, the murderer’s name was never mentioned, and Survivors: The True Heroes of Watersedge ended up being seven hour-long episodes—one for each day leading up to the release of Folly’s film—allowing us to steal any possible momentum or shock value he might have had.
We’d already watched all the episodes—some more difficult than others, especially our own. But as the button on the streaming service changed from “Coming Soon” to “Watch Now,” there was pride in knowing we got to have the final say.
Still in his lap, I nestled even deeper into Truett’s chest as he appeared on screen, sitting in the very chair we were currently in. His voice was deep and resolute as he talked about mental health, emphasizing how no one can do it alone.
Overwhelmed by his strength as he spoke through the raw emotion that had destroyed us, a single tear rolled down my cheek. My emotions never lost on him, he used the pad of his thumb to wipe it away, his other arm flexing to keep me close to his chest.
On the screen, Truett drew in a deep breath. “Life after tragedy is about surviving, healing, and moving forward. Everyone has a story, and this is ours.”
More tears escaped as I stared at the man on the TV while the real-life version of him held me in his arms. I’d never been more proud to call him my husband.
I tipped my head back so that I could peer into his eyes, whispering, “This is our future, isn’t it?”
He pressed his lips to my forehead, lingering for a moment. “You’ve always been my future, Gwen. But yeah, forever starts today.”
I smiled as I let my lids drift closed, the sound of his voice and the warmth of his embrace enveloping me. We’d come a long way, and we still had a long way to go, but the future—our future—had never been brighter.
“I love you, True.”
“I love you too. Forever.”
THE END
Meet Caven Hunt and his story of survival inside The Watersedge Mall, Written With Regret .