When Clayton ends his relationship with Rachel in the dramatic Season 26 finale of The Bachelor, she says the decision would “haunt” him.
Well, that piercing prediction officially comes true thanks to Perfect Match. In Season 3 of the dating competition, which is streaming now, Clayton is visted by the ghost of girlfriends past, when he’s absolutely astounded to see Rachel walk into the villa. Perfect Match’s first dip into more expansive reality waters is sure to make a huge splash, as familiar faces from Love Island, Siesta Key, and yes, Bachelor Nation, pair up with Netflix Reality Universe veterans.
So what do you need to know about Rachel and Clayton, and why was their split one of the messiest in Bachelor history? Keep reading to study up on their story, including their past partners, breakups, and how Gabby Windey fits into all of this.
Clayton entered Season 26 of The Bachelor in search of a wife, and Rachel was one of the 30 women vying for his affection and roses. But the bulk of the season’s dating chaos unfolded once Clayton had narrowed that group of potential mates down to just three women.
As is customary toward the end of every Bachelor season, Clayton has individual overnight dates with his final three, Rachel, Susie, and Gabby — who you may recognize from The Traitors, or viral clips of her monologuing about misandry, mood stabilizers, and the indignity of having to be productive after 3 p.m. — and that’s where things take a turn. After spending evenings with Rachel and Gabby, Clayton goes on his final fantasy suite date with Susie, where he tells her that he’s in love with her. She responds by sharing that she isn’t comfortable moving forward if he’s expressed love to the other two women or slept with them. Unfortunately, he did do both those things, so Susie leaves.
The next episode opens with Rachel and Gabby gathered for a rose ceremony where Clayton announces that he’s fallen in love with all three women and that he was “intimate” with both of them. He also shares that, as a result of all that, Susie has quit, and naturally, both women completely break down. Once they’ve collected themselves, the rose ceremony moves forward, with Clayton offering the two roses to them. Rachel accepts and Gabby does not, which leaves Rachel feeling like Clayton’s default choice. But while walking Gabby out, Clayton convinces her to stay, and both women go on to meet his family ahead of the final rose ceremony.
The emotional twists don’t stop there. Susie makes a return to the season that’s just as shocking as her exit. After both Rachel and Gabby meet his family, Clayton reveals he can’t decide between the two and he can’t stop thinking about Susie — much to his parents and brothers’ total dismay. The Bachelor finally makes a choice — he wants to see the one that got away again. Susie agrees to meet up with Clayton, and he asks for a second chance.
While Susie takes time to decide if she can move forward with Clayton, he heads out to end things with the other two, who are still hoping for forever with him. He shows up at the hotel where Rachel and Gabby are staying and breaks up with both of them at the very same time — the franchise’s first two-on-one dumping.
At the live airing of the finale, Rachel is able to face Clayton for the first time since their devastating breakup. She tells him, “I became collateral damage in your journey for love that was the most completely selfish journey … There was no empathy at all for me or Gabby.” Rachel goes on to say that she struggles to believe a single thing that Clayton says, including that he ever loved her. “You just completely disrespected me not only as someone you love but as a human. The rose ceremony and then a group breakup?” she explains. “It’s almost as if you cast us aside as soon as you could to get to the person you love the most.”
The confrontation concludes with Rachel asking a final heartbreaking question. “You told me that I was the first person that you said ‘I love you’ to in six years. I had no reason to ever doubt you, so did you tell me that you were in love with me because you wanted to sleep with me?” The Bachelor says no, but she simply cannot believe him.
In the time since then, Rachel was The Bachelorette, alongside Gabby, in Season 19 of the series. This was first time two co-leads were featured through an entire season of The Bachelorette. At the end of that season, Rachel got engaged to Tino Franco, but the two split while the season was airing due to Franco’s infidelity. During the “After the Final Rose” special, Rachel’s runner-up Aven made an appearance, and the two left the stage together in order to “catch up.” While both were open to giving their relationship another try off-camera, a lasting partnership didn’t pan out.
At the end of Season 26, Susie rejected Clayton, but in the “After the Final Rose” special, the two reveal they had gotten back together. They broke up again after nine months. In their joint breakup announcement, they wrote, “Although this last year together has brought us so much joy and so many laughs, there has also been a significant amount of pain. We know no healthy relationship comes without its struggles, but we’ve realized that we were not prepared for the external forces that hindered our ability to not only heal as individuals but also as a couple.”
Rachel also competed on Bachelor In Paradise Season 9, where she explored connections with other members of Bachelor Nation including Sean, Brayden, and Tanner from Season 20 of The Bachelorette and Jordan from Rachel’s own Bachelorette run. While on BIP, Rachel also formed a close friendship with Blake from Seasons 16 and 17 of The Bachelorette. The two have sparked dating rumors, but on an August 2024 episode of The Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous Podcast, Rachel stated, “Everyone wants us to be a couple so bad. I feel like we always address the rumor over and over again. We’re still not a couple. We’re friends.”
Clayton and Rachel’s Bachelor Nation journeys prove that he’s one serious second-guesser and she’s not opposed to giving people second chances. So could these two rekindle their relationship on the beaches of Perfect Match? Add romantic mixers, skimpy swimwear, and spicy challenges to so much shared history, and conditions could be just right for a reconnection.
