Three yellow delivery notices were wedged into the weather stripping of the front door, and the deadbolt had been locked from the outside.
The bottom slip had warped in Tuesday’s rain, but the handle was still locked tight.
My flight from Fort Gregg-Adams touched down at 1340 hours, six days before my orders had me scheduled to return to Chesapeake.
I set my green canvas duffel bag on the porch boards and reached into my uniform pocket for the brass house key.
“Hannah?”
Evelyn came down the gravel driveway next door with a plastic watering can in her left hand.
She stopped two steps past the overgrown hydrangea bush and peered over the rim of her reading glasses.
“You weren’t supposed to be back until Monday,” she said.
“The logistics convoy cleared out of Virginia Beach early,” I said, keeping my thumb pressed flat against the cold brass cylinder.
