Framed ✅

Chapter 1: The Confrontation

Tuesday, October 26 – Hendrick Motorsports Complex

"Hey!" Kyle Larson yells as he walks out of the backdoor.

"What the heck?!?" Alex Bowman questions as he follows behind his teammate.

"I'll....I'll get security," William Byron says, not knowing the full words to say in the moment as the shock hit him, as well.

The pair of Hendrick Motorsports drivers ran over and pulled the man away from their teammate, as Alex knelt down to Chase's level.

"Are you okay?" Alex questions as he looks over Chase's face, seeing the pain and agony there immediately as he held his side.

"Yeah, I'll be okay," Chase answers as he takes a deep breath, slowly standing up as he uses Alex to steady himself.

"What the hell was that about?" Kyle questions as he keeps the other gentleman back, not allowing him to make his way back over to where Chase and Alex stood.

The group was then joined by others, as William had brought a pair of the security officers out to join the group in the back parking lot at the Hendrick Motorsports complex.

"I told them we got done our meeting, came outside, and found some guy attacking Chase," William states as Kyle lets go of the man, only for security to take over.

"Are you okay?" The security officer asks Chase, to which he nods his head, despite the pain being written all over his face. There was no doubt that he was going to be sore for the next couple of days, having taken a couple punches right to the gut. "We're going to keep this individual with us, and get some identification from him to ensure that he's banned from the property. We've also already contacted local polic-"

"I'm not pressing charges," Chase states between deep breathes, catching the entire group off-guard.

"Seriously?" Kyle asks, shock written all over his face as Chase just nods back.

"Chase!" Alex starts back in return, as he trades a cautious glance with Kyle, both of them severely confused.

"The company policy states that any attacks on individuals, we are to call local police and have them check things out," the security officer begins as he keeps his eyes locked on Chase. "Therefore, we will be meeting with a police officer, as well as Mr. Hendrick. At that time, you can discuss the fact you do not want to press charges and why. In the meantime, I suggest you get checked out by our train-"

"I'm fin-" Chase starts, not wanting to draw any more attention to this. It was already a big mess, and he knew this was just going to make it bigger with the more people that got involved.

"Mr. Hendrick's rules, not mine. Besides, you cannot hide the pain entirely."

"Come on, I'll take you..." Alex states, hopeful that conversation at some point would lead to some conclusions as he could only be confused at this point.

****************

It wasn't a long visit with the trainers, but the conclusion they came to did not surprise Chase one bit based on the punches, or the pain he was feeling. There was some bruising along his side, but nothing broken or seriously damaged, so he would feel better as the bruises healed. The only solution for now? Ice and rest.

It was why now sitting in the big conference room along with his teammates, the head security officer, a police officer, the individual who went after him, and Rick Hendrick that a bag ice laid against his side.

"We were called to the complex by your security due to an individual going after one of your employees," the police officer states as Alex and Kyle lock eyes on the elder man who had laid the punches on Chase. They were still beyond confused and kept asking themselves why could this possibly happen. "Could someone explain what happened?"

"Kyle and I came out of the back door to the building, and saw this man attacking Chase," Alex states, not wanting to back down from it one bit. The fact that Chase did not want to press charges or do anything about this was shocking. "So we went over and separated them, while William got security."

"Do you want to discuss what happened, Mr. Elliott?" Chase takes a deep breath, just wishing this would all go away already. This whole mess just seemed to be getting bigger, and all he wanted was space right now.

"He came up to me and started yelling at me about a bunch of things," he states, not wanting to get into the details if he didn't need to. It wasn't why like everybody in this room knew the full truth yet and he would prefer to keep it that way. "I told him to calm down, tried to back him off, convince him otherwise. He then took a shot at me, I tried to defend myself without hurting him, and he got the better of me."

"And I understand that you do not want to press charges?" The police officer asks to which Chase nods his head.

"May I ask why?" Kyle interrupts, still very confused about the whole ordeal. There was nothing comforting about someone coming on the company property, doing this, and getting away with it.

"He's dealing with a lot of grief-" Chase starts as he keeps his eyes focused on the table, feeling the tears come back that he had not been able to subside the past week.

"Because you killed my daughter!" The man shouts across the table, causing shocked faces to appear on everyone – except for Rick Hendrick, whom was aware of the situation already from Chase.

"As I told you outside, I did not kill your daughter. I was trying to help her. Once the police complete the investigation, you'll learn whom the true killer was." He then takes a deep breath, knowing it was a matter of time before more people figured it all out anyway. Besides, was it too terrible that his teammates knew the truth? "There was some evidence found at the crime scene that connected to me, so I am right now as suspect."

"That's impossible," William comments, knowing that killing someone would never be in Chase's nature from how well they had gotten to know each other as teammates.

"With having lost a son, I understand the pain of grief is not easy to deal with," Rick Hendrick starts as he lays his eyes on the older gentleman. "But taking justice into your own hands is not the solution. You need to let the justice system, from the investigators to the courts, do their job and find out the truth as to what happened." Rick takes a glance over at Chase, before returning his eyes to the gentleman. "I agree with Chase's stance in not pressing charges, for sake of understanding. However, you are banned from company property as I feel it's best that you keep your distance until this is worked out."

"And when the truth comes out, I hope you fire his ass," the older gentleman says before standing up and leaving the room immediately. He is then quickly followed by security and the police officer, leaving just Rick and his drivers sitting round the conference room table.

"Chase, I suggest you take care of yourself and take it easy. If you need anything else as you handle this, you know where to find me." Chase nods his head accepting, as he takes a deep breath. "As for the rest of you, you did a good job taking care of your teammate. But now you know something is going on, please keep it quiet and don't push him to tell you the details."

Rick then gets up and leaves the room, which left the four drivers sitting around the table looking at each other.

"Do you want to come back to my house while you wait for your dad?" Alex asks, assuming that Bill was probably going to fly him home now after this whole ordeal.

"Aren't you going to ask me what's going on?" Chase questions, to which earns a shrug of the shoulders from the group as they each get up to leave the room.

"We respect your privacy, and we believe no matter what it is, that you're innocent," Kyle answers as he heads towards the doorway, set to get out of there. He had a midget to work on for Millbridge on Wednesday night.

"We're also here for you, and am willing to do whatever it takes that you need to help you," William adds as Alex stands back, still awaiting for an answer to his question.

"Actually, I wouldn't mind telling someone," Chase reveals, causing the trio to freeze and look towards their teammate. While they weren't about to pry, they could not help but be curious and in another way, do whatever they could do to help. "It may help to talk to someone other than my parents and have them understand what's going on...."