‘The Bachelor’ Recap: Zach’s Self-Imposed No Intimacy Rule Leads To Messy Fantasy Suites

Katie Campione
·8 min read
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SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from Season 27, Episode 10 of ABC‘s The Bachelor.

It’s time for fantasy suites on Season 27 of The Bachelor. Or, as Zach calls it, sex week.

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Except…maybe not. After arriving in Thailand, where Zach will meet his final three women, he says that he isn’t planning on being intimate with any of them, despite the implications that come with spending the night together for the first time.

This is also a big week for Zach, because he made it this far on Season 19 of The Bachelorette with Rachel Recchia. Being back at this stage of the process makes him anxious, but he says he’s just trying to do what feels right.

“What’s most important to me and to express to each and every one of the women is no sex. No sex of any kind for fantasy suites,” he said, adding that speaking with former Bachelor Sean Lowe encouraged him to take this route in an effort to not “muddy the situation.”

Well, based on the previews for this episode, that doesn’t exactly work out for Zach the way he planned, but let’s just see how it goes.

Gabi, Ariel and Kaity are all (understandably) very nervous as they begin to think about how in just one short week they could be engaged. But they are also excited about what’s to come. While not all of them have expressed it to Zach just yet, they all admit to the cameras that they’re falling in love.

Ariel is up first. Right off the bat, she says that she’s intrigued to explore the physicality of their relationship, because that’s important to her. Zac hasn’t exactly told her that he isn’t planning on getting physical, but during the date he does admit that their chemistry is “spicy.”

Their date starts with a stroll through a night market, where they try several different Thai dishes. Ariel tells Zach this is the type of date she prefers, rather than something overly romantic. She likes to do things where both partners feel tested in some way…little does she know they may be more tested than they realize! The producers are certainly leaning into this sex week thing.

During the dinner portion of the date, they both admit that they feel like they’re in their “own little world” when they’re with each other. But Ariel says she still thinks she’s been holding back, because she tends to retreat when she feels deeply for someone. She didn’t plan to tell Zach that she was falling in love with him, but she does. Zach says it feels special to hear that from her, and he takes love very seriously. The leads aren’t exactly supposed to say they’re in love quite yet, so he just says that he could see a future with her. That’s when he finally tells Ariel that he doesn’t want to be physically intimate with any of the women this week. She says she wasn’t expecting sex, and she is totally fine with keeping it PG. During her confessional, she admits she feels a little disappointed, but she wants Zach to feel supported.

Well, by the time they make it to the suite, Zach already appears to be tempted. They go for a dip in the hot tub before retreating back to the room. When they wake up, Ariel says that she feels like their relationship is leaps and bounds ahead of where it was. Zach echoes that sentiment and also says that, while tempted, he and Ariel did not have sex.

Now it’s time for Gabi to see Zach. They reunite on a beach, where Zach tells her that they’ll be spending the day on a private island. Once they reach the island, Gabi says she’s been feeling a little in her head. She feels like in previous relationships she was chosen second, so having to wait nearly two weeks to see him again has made her feel a little bit insecure. During their conversation, Gabi tells Zach she needs a minute and starts crying as she walks away. Zach eventually finds her and asks her to open up about her feelings rather than hide. She says that Zach hasn’t made her feel insecure through his actions, it’s just a hard process. Zach validates her feelings and tells her that he never wants her to feel like she isn’t his priority.

They both leave that conversation feeling it a bit better about where they’re at. At dinner, Gabi tells Zach that she’s always felt like a priority with him, and she is falling in love with him. Cue the sappy music! Zach pulls out the fantasy suite card, and that’s when he lets her in on his no-sex plans. Gabi says that she wasn’t expecting to get engaged to someone she’d never been physically intimate with, but she ultimately comes to terms with it and the pair venture off to their private room.

The next morning, Gabi and Zach say they feel confident waking up next to each other, and Gabi says that they had a great “cuddle sesh.” But then…Zach lets us know that “something really special” happened between the two of them that derailed his plans for the week (which…we all know what that means). He confides in Jesse, admitting he feels terrible for going against his word. He doesn’t regret being intimate with Gabi, but he is disappointed in himself for making things a little messier than he intended.

He says he feels compelled to tell the other women about what happened…and that feels like it can only make things messier. But he insists it was an “act of love, not lust” and he doesn’t want to enter into any relationship with a secret.

Don’t forget, Zach has one more date left — this time with Kaity. But first, he goes to visit Gabi again to tell her that he feels he needs to share what happened with the other women. Unsurprisingly, she is not happy. She says she thought that it would stay between them, and she feels blindsided because nothing in their relationship feels private. But in a potentially unexpected turn of events, Zach also tells Gabi that he’s falling in love with her and he doesn’t want her to doubt their relationship.

Now Zach is off to his date with Kaity. They’re going kayaking, and the entire time Zach has this secret looming over his head. He thinks she deserves “full transparency,” and he wants to tell her about what happened with Gabi. Before things can really get going, Zach decides to get that off his chest and…as expected, Kaity is not thrilled.

Zach says he went into the week not wanting to have sex with any of the women, but things changed and he has “been intimate.” He says he felt like it’s what felt right and he “tried to set parameters on how to love” and it made things rough for him. Kaity starts crying and says she assumed that intimacy was part of the plan, but she definitely could have gone without the confirmation. She tells the camera she’s “crushed.”

There is obvious tension in the air after their conversation, and Zach is doing everything he can to dispel it. But Kaity tries to explain that he didn’t need to explain his relationship with the other women to her and, despite his own guilt, she didn’t want to hear about him being intimate with Gabi. She’s having a hard time being happy during their date now, and she isn’t sure how to move past it. Zach isn’t fully able to process or understand her reaction, which confuses Kaity because she isn’t sure how else he would expect her to react to that news.

She tells the producers that she’s not happy, and she doesn’t know if she can continue the night with Zach. Uh oh. Well, that anxiety is short lived, because Kaity does end up continuing her date with Zach. She’s not exactly thrilled to be there, but she’s trying to move past it. Zach asks her how she’s doing, and he says he wants to figure things out. Kaity says that she wasn’t sure if she would show up for dinner, because she’d already had a tough week leading up to fantasy suites. Last time she saw Zach, she told him she was falling in love with him, so to then reunite with him only to hear he’d had sex with another woman was quite the blindside. She admits that she does feel confident in their relationship though, and she does want to find a way to move past this.

Zach pulls out the fantasy suite card, and they do, in fact, decide to venture to their private room.

Now, the final rose ceremony is upon them. Gabi says she feels blindsided by Zach’s decision to tell everyone about their fantasy suite. Her trust is broken, and she thinks he cleared his conscience at the expense of her heart. Kaity is also still feeling a bit unsure, but she says they really grew through that rocky experience together. And Ariel still has no idea this even went down, as far as we know.

Zach hands out his two roses to Gabi and Kaity, sending Ariel home. Next week, he’ll be handing out his final rose and an engagement ring.

The Bachelor finale airs next Monday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC and next day on Hulu.

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