Cake-gate continues. After throwing Demi Burnett’s birthday cake for Kenny Braasch in the fire on Bachelor in Paradise, Mari Pepin-Solis is giving more insight into why she was so upset about the situation.
“Kenny’s 40th birthday, we were quarantining before we started filming and he spent it there. And I came up with the idea because I knew it was his birthday. I want to do a birthday party, I wanted to do a cake,” the 25-year-old Bachelor alum said on the “Click Bait” podcast. “Now whether or not Demi knew this is — obviously, there’s production involved in that element. But the whole thing was my idea. And so to see her come down with the cake and to do this whole birthday celebration that I wanted to do and that I was planning to do, that is what sent me over the edge and that’s what said ‘Alright, this cake in the fire.’”
During the Monday, August 30, episode of the ABC series, Mari was seen telling Kenny, 40, that she wanted to keep her options open and have the chance to explore other relationships if she was asked on a date. After confiding in Demi, 26, about the situation, the Texas native pursued the boyband manager and they ended up hooking up in the boom boom room.
“Initially, we had a conversation about not going on dates with other people [and] it wasn’t shown,” Mari told Tayshia Adams, Joe Amabile and Natasha Parker. “And then after sleeping on it a little bit, after getting some opinions [and] advice — I talked to Wells [Adams] a little bit and I asked him, ‘When do couples usually start to become more exclusive?’ And he said not until, like, week three or four usually. And at this point, we’re just before the second rose ceremony, so it was very early on. And so I went back and I told [Kenny], ‘Listen, I feel like it’s early on, I care about you, I have feelings for you. I really like where this is going. However, I feel like it’s still too early to cut it off and to say, you know, this is it, we’re not going to go on dates with other people.’ Because my whole point for going to Paradise was to find the person that I’m supposed to be with. And my thought process at the time was, ‘Yes, this is great and I really like it, but I don’t want to live with regrets. How do I know if Kenny is supposed to be you know, the person that I end up with? If I don’t explore and see what else is around?’ Because you can’t just close yourself off immediately. Because then something that is meant for you could pass you by.”
After their chat, Demi swooped in and presented Kenny with the now-infamous birthday cake. Wells, 37, confirmed on his podcast that Mari was hoping to celebrate Kenny’s birthday with baked goods.
“[It] wasn’t really shown. I think that Mari had the idea to do a birthday celebration for Kenny and Demi beat her to it. And I think that really kind of fueled the fire a little bit,” the bartender explained to cohost Brandi Cyrus on their “Your Favorite Thing” podcast. “There was a lot of conversations that we had that I had with her at the bar being like, ‘Hey, man, you kind of screwed this up. It’s OK you can fix it.’ But you can’t be mad at this poor kid. Because I think that what she thought was going to happen was that there was going to be more guys for her to date, not realizing that girls were coming in.”
Bachelor in Paradise airs on ABC Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET.
