'I just got a weird vibe from him,' Cam tells ET of his reaction to the controversial contestant.
Controversial contestant Luke P. got a bit aggressive while trying to stake his claim on Hannah Brown on Monday's episode of The Bachelorette, and the other men took note.
The 24-year-old former pageant queen confronted Luke several times during the episode, warning him to give her space and let her pursue relationships with other men. During an interview with ET's Lauren Zima on Tuesday's Roses and Rose, castoff Cam Ayala said he tried to remove himself from Luke's path of potential destruction, and that other men did the same.
"Luke was one of those guys I distanced myself from in the house... I just got a weird vibe from him," Cam explained, adding that he didn't want to comment on Luke's character specifically. "He's a big personality. He's a former collegiate athlete, so I know he has a very competitive nature... he had a very different approach than the other guys in the house."
"Several guys [also distanced themselves]," Cam continued, before noting that he didn't actually hear many of Luke's comments about how he should be with Hannah over the other men. He did, however, recognize early on that Luke had a special connection with Hannah.
"Luke was definitely the frontrunner, at least in my mind... we could just kind of tell from the symbolism of getting the first impression rose and crowning him Mr. Right from the first group date," he explained. "He was someone I thought would be the most competition to myself."
Luke was given Hannah's first impression rose, while Cam earned the actual first rose of the season after meeting the Bachelorette on Colton Underwood's After the Final Rose. The pair's relationship seemed to start strong, but ended dramatically, after Cam shared his story about his struggle with Lymphedema, which another contestant, Mike, had told Hannah was an attempt to earn a "pity rose."
"No, I never said [pity rose]," Cam told ET, revealing that it was "disheartening" to be sent home after being so vulnerable. "I don't feel like pity is anything you'd want. ...It seems like a sign of weakness."
Cam also said that despite Mike's claims, he wasn't writing goodbye letters to other men in the house. "It wasn't to Hannah, it wasn't to the guys, and I'll leave it to that," he mysteriously said, before confirming his letters may have been to members of the crew. "Maybe, maybe not."
Regardless of Mike calling him out, Cam doesn't want to keep up the beef. "I just want to kind of squash the beef and move on and hope that he finds love and I find love, " he said. He also has no regrets about sharing his story with Hannah. "I wasn't looking for pity. It was more for transparency moving forward," he explained.
And though his relationship with Hannah didn't work out, Cam said there's a possibility he could be getting a second chance at love on Bachelor in Paradise this summer.
"I was really drawn to Caelynn [Miller-Keyes]," he admitted of who he's interested in meeting on the beach. "Demi [Burnett] is a big personality too. And then there's Hannah G., the gangster herself. Maybe I'll come out of my retirement for a freestyle rap battle."
The Bachelorette airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC. Join ET's Bachelor Nation Facebook group here.
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