Clayton Echard went on his fantasy suite dates with his final three women — Gabby Windey, Rachel Recchia and Susie Evans — on the March 8 episode of The Bachelor. At the beginning of the episode, Clayton admitted he was “falling in love” with Gabby and Rachel, and said that he might already be “in love” with Susie. Clayton spent the night with both Gabby and Rachel on their dates. By the morning after his date with Rachel, he told her he was in love with her. With Gabby, he told her he was falling in love.
Even before her date, this was something Susie feared, and she got emotional about it before her one-on-one. “I’m hoping that he takes physical intimacy as serious as I do,” she said. “Sex is incredibly important in a relationship but it’s something I only do with people I have some form of commitment with. If I find out he’s falling in love with other women or he has become physically intimate with another woman, that would be devastating.”
Susie flat-out said she’d have a “hard time moving forward” with Clayton if he told her he could see her at the end…but also slept with another woman. Meanwhile, after his first two dates, Clayton started getting anxious, too. “All of a sudden everything came crashing back in,” he said. “A thousand percent, I’m absolutely going to shatter somebody. I just don’t want to hurt anybody, but I’m going do I wanted to fall in love, I just didn’t want to fall in love with multiple people.”
During the dinner portion of their date, Clayton told Susie he was was in love with her, which led her to question where he stood with Gabby and Rachel and whether he slept with them. “There are things I feel like I can’t compromise,” Susie told Clayton. “If I’m sharing your love with somebody else, I don’t think that I would be comfortable.”
Clayton was noticeably caught off-guard. “The big thing I’m shocked at is you did say to explore the relationships,” Clayton said. “I thought when we talked, it was you saying, ‘I want you to explore and I don’t want to be the default a the end of it, I want you to pick me for me.’ To answer your question, yes. I have slept with someone here. And yes, I have expressed feelings toward someone else of falling in love.”
Susie told Clayton that she didn’t want to give him an ultimatum not to sleep with other women. However, she admitted that she thought he would respect her enough not to be intimate with anyone else if he thought she could be his fiancee at the end. Clayton told Susie he was “more in love” with her than anyone else, and begged her not to talk through it and not walk away.
Hearing that made things worse for Susie. “You’ve reassured my ability to know that there’s good men out there,” Susie said, through tears. “I’ve had some bad experiences, but this is something very big to me and I don’t think I can get past those things. I just don’t thing I can.”
Clayton began to get frustrated and told Susie that if she had given him an ultimatum before fantasy suites, he would’ve “approached things differently.” He also did admit to sleeping with BOTH Gabby and Rachel, but told Susie that she was worth fighting for and said that he would spend all night talking it through if she was willing to fight for their love, too. Still, Susie wasn’t sure she could move forward. She said she was “confused” and didn’t know what to do.
Susie wound up crying and walking out on Clayton at dinner. He then stormed out of the room in frustration. “This is exactly what I was afraid of,” Clayton said. “She just invalidated everything.” After some time apart, Susie approached Clayton again. She told him she felt awful about how she handled things, and he couldn’t hide his anger any longer. “If this was such a big dealbreaker for you, why would you not bring this up?” he asked, raising his voice.
Clayton and Susie were not able to get on the same page about what she expected from him and how he felt she should have handled it. The conversation turned tense. “I don’t agree with it at all how you went about this,” Clayton said. “I’m done. We’re not getting anything out of what we’re saying anymore. I’m sorry I have to raise my voice. It’s out of character for me but it’s because I care so much and I really did love you. To see this ripped away from me is why you’re seeing what you’re seeing right now. I have nothing more to say. Anything you say to me at this point doesn’t matter anymore.”
He walked her to the car and they did not end on a good note. However, Susie tried to apologize one last time before leaving. “I’m sorry that this is the way that this has gone,” she told Clayton. “I genuinely want you to know that this was real for me. I know you don’t want to hear anything at this point and I can tell every ounce in you that you probably hate me at this point and I’m genuinely sorry for the pain I’ve caused you. I promise you that every ounce of this has been real and genuine and I actually feel awful at how this has gone down.”
Clayton once again slammed Susie for not sticking by him and trying to fight through it. She finally got in the car to leave and was clearly upset. “I thought he’d have more compassion for me at the end, regardless of what he thought at this point,” she admitted. “I thought he would’ve been better about getting through that conversation kindly.” By the end of the night, Clayton said his heart wasn’t in the experience in general anymore.
