You were always intense. One of those presences that a house never forgets, as if your screams and perfume had permeated the walls. Even among so many ghosts, your death left a distinct mark—more vivid than anyone else's. Tate knew it. There was something about you that tied him more than to all the other women behind those cursed walls. Something about you kept him gentle and almost human every time you looked at him.

Moira used to warn him to stop indulging the women in this house and feeding his sick need to be loved by them. But Tate couldn't. Not when it came to you. To stop would be a crime, and he had already paid for too many. He couldn't bear your silence nor the icy distance that arose after you learned of his plan with Nora. You hated her for good reason: She tried to take the only thing that still belonged to you in your eternal condemnation—the love he knew how to give.

It had only been a few days since he killed Chad and his boyfriend— You thought it was just another impulse, another one of his crises. Maybe you could have forgiven that slip-up. But the baby thing... Oh, that was something else.

Since then, you had lost the desire to "play." No longer sought his lips, hands, love, or pleasure. For Tate, that was a wound. He couldn't bear to see you become distant and dull, as if the love you shared had died like a flower.

First, his restless mind began to fabricate ideas and twist his paranoia. He thought maybe you were like Patrick; Running away a few hours to be with someone else, either a boring ghost or an unconscious person who crossed the threshold by mistake. But you didn't come back. Your absence devastated him more than he would admit.

Was he the problem? Had you stopped liking him? Did he disgust you? The question burned in his throat like acid.

He tried to follow Chad's toxic techniques, looking for traces of cologne on your clothes—any clue. Nothing. Still, he didn't trust you. Doubt was a poison that kept him awake, even in eternity.

Then Tate decided to do something about it. He couldn't let you forget him. His selfishness was part of what kept him going— He damn needed you, wanted to keep you on his side forever even if it meant using force. He wasn't going to apologize for that.

The black latex suit enveloped him like a second skin once again, glistening under the dim light of the bathroom lamp. The garment he had once used to kill had become a costume of hope. It had been unable to save love and rekindle the flame of passion in the past, but with you, it had to work. It had to.

When he saw you lying on the bed in your old room, his before too, between white sheets that Moira had changed with almost ritualistic meticulousness; Even if the house was put up for sale again. He knew it was his chance. The air was thick and heavy with the expectant silence that precedes inevitable mistakes.

He appeared without warning. As always.

A pair of latex-clad arms closed around you with deceptive gentleness, as if afraid of breaking you. But when you tried to push him away, his grip became hard and desperate; His hands sank into your waist and moved up to your chest until you could feel his ragged breathing behind the mask.

"Why?" he murmured, his voice breaking. "Did you stop loving me? Don't you want to play with me like you used to?"

Anxiety overwhelmed him. His fingers slid slowly and tremulously across your abdomen until they reached your neck, gripped your jaw tightly and pressed his thumb between your lips, searching for the thing you always made; Suck his thumb. His other hand wrapped around your throat like a necklace. There was no anger, only panic and a visceral fear of loss.

He wasn't going to let you off so easily.