Former Bachelor Jake Pavelka is engaged!
The season 14 Bachelor, 48, is set to wed his girlfriend of two years, Aimee, he revealed to People in an interview published on Saturday, February 14.
Jake and Aimee matched on dating app Bumble in January 2024. Jake popped the question to Aimee at their home in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 2025, he said.
“We went and had a great dinner and laughed and had champagne,” Jake told People. “Then we took an Uber back to our apartment. I had rose petals on the ground and a table set up with candles. We walked in the apartment and she was like, ‘What’s going on here? Did somebody break into our apartment?’ She was looking at a table trying to figure out how a candle got lit.”
“When she turned around, I was down on one knee with a really pretty ring, and I asked her to marry me,” Jake said. “She kind of gasped and then muttered yes. It was sweet and intimate. I definitely made the right choice keeping it private. It was a really special moment.”
Jake admitted to having some frayed nerves before he proposed to Aimee.
“We live in a high-rise in Dallas, so on the way to dinner, I walked Aimee to the elevator and then I said, ‘Oh, my gosh, I forgot something. I got to run back to the apartment real quick,’” the former reality star said. “I frantically ripped a bag of rose petals open, I pulled the table away from the wall and set a battery-operated candle on there. I sprinkled the roses everywhere and decorated real quick, got back to the elevator and she was like, ‘What did you forget?’ I was like, ‘I needed to get a drink of water.’ I couldn’t even think of a good lie.”
The former pilot previously gushed about meeting Aimee on Bumble in an October 2024 interview on the “Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous” podcast.
While some roses stand the test of time, others wilt before the Neil Lane engagement ring can be resized. The Bachelor premiered on ABC in March 2002 with Alex Michel dubbed the world’s most eligible Bachelor. More than 20 women competed for his heart and one of the most successful reality TV franchises was born. […]
“We matched in, like, the 15 minutes I turned it on,” he said of swiping right after a flight from his Dallas home base to Santa Barbara, California. “I said, ‘I’m not looking for a long-distance relationship’ and she said something kind of fun, like, ‘Well, you couldn’t handle it anyway.’ I was like, ‘Oh, OK.’ This is probably the girl. She’s so wonderful.”
Jake first appeared on screens during Jillian Harris’ season of The Bachelorette in 2009. He was the star of The Bachelor season 14 the following year. Jake proposed to Vienna Girardi in the season finale, which aired in March 2010, however, the couple went their separate ways by June that same year.
The exes had a tense showdown during a July 2010 episode of The Bachelorette as then-host Chris Harrison sat down with the pair to discuss what went wrong.
“When we were at home [it was] lonely,” Girardi said at the time. “I just wanted him to be around me and talk to me and kiss me like a normal relationship. My impression was that you were a pilot and we would go back to Dallas and live a normal life. All of a sudden, you were in LA and you were pursuing an acting career.”
