The Bachelor bachelorette Sierra Jackson has explained why she told Clayton Echard about Cassidy Timbrooks' friend with benefits back home when Cassidy had seemed to tell her that story in confidence.
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After Clayton gave Cassidy a group-date rose earlier this season, he decided to send her packing once he learned from Sierra that Cassidy had been hooking up with a younger man back home and FaceTimed with him while she was quarantining in a hotel prior to the start of Season 26 production.
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Sierra told Clayton about Cassidy's "f-ck buddy" who allegedly told Cassidy that he'd like to cuddle and do "nasty things" to her once she returned home from the show, which he also allegedly suggested they could watch together.
"I was just really putting myself in Clayton's shoes. Part of me was like, 'No, I don't want to say anything at all because I want to get to know him.' We don't get a lot of time with this man -- at all," Sierra said on Wednesday's episode of the "Bachelor Happy Hour" podcast hosted by Becca Kufrin and co-hosted by Serena Pitt.
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"So the time that you do get [with Clayton], you do want to utilize it to the best of your ability."
Sierra continued, "But at the same time, I'm thinking, 'Okay, if I was him and I was in his shoes, I would be pissed -- beyond pissed -- if a man sat down and had a date with me and smiled or kissed me or did anything and then in the back of his mind he had this information and he knew it and he kept it to himself.'"
Sierra pointed out how there's another line of thinking such as, "If this person's judgement is good, than he'll find out... eventually," or, "I trust him and I trust his judgement."
"It's like 'no,'" she explained, "because at the same time, they trust you, and they trust that you're going to be open and honest with them at all times and not put them in harm's way."
Clayton has also said multiple times in the press that he wasn't privy to a lot of the drama going on in the house unless a bachelorette told him about it. After all, the girls were together a lot more without Clayton than they were together with him on group dates.
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"So in my opinion, keeping that information to yourself is setting somebody up for failure, and when you care about somebody or you love someone or you're having a real relationship with someone, you do not keep things from them. You don't," Sierra said.
She added, "You're going to share and you're going to be honest and you're going to be open -- even if that's detrimental to you. So that's just the truth of it all."
Sierra recalled putting herself "aside" as well as her own "selfish desires" to protect Clayton.
"[Instead of] being able to have a good time with him, I just decided to talk to him and say, 'Hey, this is really what's going on. It sucks that I have to tell you this and it sucks that I have to use my time, and it sucks that you have to hear this because it's embarrassing -- because you gave her a rose -- but it's going to be even more embarrassing if you keep her on,'" Sierra shared.
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When Clayton rejected Cassidy and took back her rose, he explained how he didn't want to fall for a woman who seemed to be on the show for the wrong reasons.
He said there were "too many concerns" for him to overlook so early in The Bachelor process.
"Being dishonest is a dealbreaker for me because love is ultimately being able to fully trust someone and share your heart," Clayton told the cameras, referencing how Cassidy initially lied about having been involved with any man back home.
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When Cassidy initially told Sierra the story about her hookup back home, Sierra said a lot of things were going through her mind.
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"One [of them] was, 'Why are you telling me this right now?' That was the first thing... like, 'What the heck?! Why are you telling me this? But keep going, don't stop!'" Sierra said with a laugh.
Cassidy apparently shared the information about her friend with benefits with only Sierra and Ency Abedin.
"We were the only people that knew, and we kind of kept it [between] each other. We didn't want to blow it up throughout the house because what good is that going to do?" Sierra reasoned with Becca and Serena.
"Obviously none. It's just going to piss everybody off, you know? So we kind of contained it."
Out of the three women, Sierra is the only one still competing for Clayton's final rose.
Cassidy has since apologized for lashing out at Clayton in fiery social-media videos that resurfaced prior to the airing of her The Bachelor exit on ABC.
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