The Brendan-Pieper storyline was first brought up earlier this season after he got into romantic entanglements with both Demi Burnett and Natasha Parker. After making an initial connection with Natasha, Brendan went on a date with BiP veteran Demi, who showed up on the season’s second day. But on their date, Brendan made it very clear to Demi that he wanted to keep his options open (even as he continued to suggest that he was really into Natasha). At the same time, the rest of the BiP Season 7 cast began gossiping about how Brendan had been dating Pieper—who had yet to appear on the Season 7 beach—back in the real world. Details were scarce and pretty confusing; some claimed that Brendan and Pieper had just talked before Season 7 started filming, while others swore they were in a full-on relationship. But as it turns out, their relationship was not just a Paradise rumor. So…what’s the deal? Here’s everything we know about Bachelor Nation stars Brendan and Pieper on Bachelor in Paradise!
Will Brendan and Pieper leave Paradise?
As it turns out, yes! On the Sept. 14 episode, the two finally decided to cut their losses and exit together after JoeAmabile led several of the show’s contestants (all women, which was interesting) in a near-revolt against them. Reality Steve had previously reported that the two would indeed head home, leaving the show before the overnight dates—and that their early departure will have something to do with the connection they had before the show started filming. “I believe they started getting called out for it by others,” Reality Steve wrote in a blog post. (Spot on, Steve!)
Did Pieper James and Brendan Morais date before Bachelor in Paradise?
The timeline is a little tricky to parse out, but let’s try. On Season 7’s second episode, Brendan told Demi that he’s “not in a relationship with Pieper,” but admitted they spent time together. “We hung out, we communicated and that’s that. There’s no relationship,” he said. Once Pieper arrived and made a beeline toward Brendan, she told Natasha that she last saw Brendan “right before” he came to the beach to start filming Season 7, which kicked off production in June 2021. Then on the Sept. 14 episode, Brendan admitted to Joe and his posse that he’d seen Pieper the night before he headed to Paradise to join the BiP Season 7 cast. Meanwhile, back in early June, a source told Us Weekly that the Brendan and Pieper had been together “for a few weeks,” and that they’d been traveling long-distance to see each other. “Either he’ll fly to New York and hang with her, or she’ll fly to Boston to hang with him,” the insider said. “She was most recently in Boston over Memorial Day weekend and they were even spotted out in public together.” The source added that the two have “mutual friends” and that they “hang out in the same Bachelor crowd.” So it seems that yes, Brendan and Pieper were an item in the real world when he joined Bachelor in Paradise Season 7—despite what he’d told Natasha toward the start of the season. That’s why, when Pieper showed up on the beach on the Sept. 6 episode, she promptly used her date card to get some one-on-one time with Brendan. That’s also when Brendan basically admitted that he’d been using Natasha to stretch out his time on BiP until Pieper could join the show. For what it’s worth, on the night of Sept. 14, Pieper wrote in an Instagram Story post, “As my time [on] Paradise concludes, I would like to clear up one final point of contention. Amidst everything that’s been happening on and off screen, Brendan and I were not in an exclusive relationship in any capacity before filming.”
Who is Pieper James?
Pieper was on MattJames’ season of The Bachelor. The two bonded over their shared last name and went on a sweet carnival date, but Pieper’s feelings developed a little fast for Matt. He ended up sending her home on Week 7 after she told him she was falling in love with him. As Pieper reminded viewers on the Sept. 14 episode, she also has a master’s degree in marketing—which, by her own claim, should’ve been enough to increase her social media follower count without also scheming to pulling a fast one on national TV.
Are Pieper James and Brendan Morais still together?
It seems that yes, now that BiP Season 7 has finished filming, Brendan and Pieper are still a real-world couple. “They just bounced, but are dating post-show,” Reality Steve said. Reality Steve also tweeted about the two after filming and even shared a photo of the the alleged-couple together. “They’ve been seen quite a few times since they left BiP together before the final day, but here was Brendan and Pieper yesterday outside of the SLS hotel in Miami,” Reality Steve tweeted last month. Worth noting: The photo was shot from behind and it’s kind of hard to make out who those people are, but Pieper shared a pic on Instagram of herself in the exact same bikini on Sunday. Evidence: The verdict: As Brendan put it himself in a since-deleted, Sept. 6 Instagram post, he’s apparently been on Bachelor in Paradise “for the wrong reasons”—seemingly because he was secretly waiting for Pieper to arrive on the beach all along. While Brendan and Pieper haven’t paid the piper (sorry!) so far on BiP Season 7, it seems their social media profiles have taken a hit due to their duplicity. Check out how many followers they apparently lost on Instagram in just the first 24 hours after their scheming came to light: Next, Ivan Hall is Making Bachelor in Paradise fans swoon! See the sweetest tweets about him.
