BREMERTON — Photographs on Francisco and Marie Rivera’s social media accounts show the Alaska couple always smiling, always embracing: at their wedding, hanging out with family and friends, hanging out with each other.

In one photo, posted Sept. 6, 2015, the groom and bride kiss for a wedding portrait; she is holding a bouquet of lavender and white flowers. In posts responding to that photo and others, family and friends comment about how happy the couple looks.

“It’s going to be so hard to see you move but I know he will protect you and treat you [right],” Marie’s father wrote in response to another photo of the young couple, again smiling. “Every night I prayed that you would be the [woman] you are today. … I am so proud of you Marie and I always will be.”

Today, family and friends and authorities are trying to piece together what went wrong.“Things may not have been what they were behind closed doors,” Bremerton Police Sgt. Aaron Elton said Dec. 18.

Francisco Rivera, a sailor aboard the USS Nimitz (CVN 68), is believed to have stabbed his wife to death in the bedroom of their home and then hanged himself in the kitchen, just days after he returned home from deployment.

The couple was home alone when the deaths occurred, Elton said.

The night before the deaths, Rivera had gone out drinking with two shipmates, Elton said. At 2:56 a.m. Dec. 13, Rivera changed his Facebook profile photo; in the photo, he’s wearing a Navy ball cap. Authorities don’t know yet where he was when the photo was taken.

“This is the day you killed my granddaughter,” Marie Rivera’s grandmother wrote on Rivera’s Facebook page a few days later.

Kitsap News Group reached out to Marie Rivera’s father and grandmother on Dec. 18. Meanwhile, Bremerton police continue to investigate. Among the evidence being studied: text messages and cell phone calls made on the Rivera’s phone. Rivera’s locker and belongings aboard the Nimitz have been secured, and the command and Naval Criminal Intelligence Service are conducting investigations, Lt. Cmdr. Theresa Donnelly said.

The Bremerton Police Department is the lead investigating agency, Donnelly said. The Kitsap County Coroner’s Office completed autopsies, but referred all questions to the Bremerton Police Department.

More about the couple from their social media accounts and information from the Navy.

Marie attended A.J. Dimond High School and Alaska Military Youth Academy, then studied at Alaska Career College to become a medical assistant.

Francisco was a native of Hesperia, California, and attended West Anchorage High School. He enlisted in the Navy on Nov. 17, 2015, was assigned to the air division aboard the USS Nimitz (CVN 68), and on June 1, 2017 embarked with his ship on a six-month deployment to the Middle East. He was advanced in pay grade to E-3 two weeks later. He earned $1,886 a month, according to Navy pay information available online, but having passed the two-year mark in his enlistment he would have been eligible for a pay increase to $2,004 a month.

Airman Rivera had a good record, Donnelly reported.

During the Nimitz’s return home, Rivera and his fellow crew members attended classes designed to help them adjust to being home.

“Nearly a dozen staff members from Fleet and Family Service Center boarded the ship as she was making her transit to Hawaii and taught 12 classes, ranging from suicide prevention to car buying strategies to anger management, with a major emphasis on conflict management and how to navigate healthy intimate relationships,” Donnelly reported.

“Like every sailor on board, Airman Rivera had access to those classes. Additionally, our executive officer led an initiative to ask seven detailed questions regarding sailors’ plans for homeport, which had department head direct oversight.”

Information about Rivera’s responses to those questions were not available.

On Dec. 13, three days after the Nimitz returned home, Bremerton police were dispatched to 131 N. Marion Ave., across the street from the Bremerton School District administration building, in response to a report of two people deceased inside the home. It was shortly before 7 p.m.

The deceased were identified as Francisco and Marie Rivera. Investigators believe the airman fatally stabbed his wife and then hanged himself.

He was 23, she was 22.

A neighbor, Alexis Gregory, said others who lived closest to the Rivera home heard arguing coming from the house.

But Jena Staples, a neighbor, said of the couple, “They seemed like they got along really well … Everything seemed perfectly fine.”

The Rivera family was notified on Dec. 14. The USS Nimitz is making a civilian resiliency counselor, chaplains and medical psychiatry staff available as needed to crew members.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and crew members affected during this difficult time,” Donnelly said.

— With reporting by Nick Twietmeyer