As American Horror Story: Hotel Season 5 Episode 3 begins Tristan is searching for James Patrick March. James takes Tristan on a walking tour of his murder palace, encouraging the new immortal to put the rooms to good use. In the hall they hear Will Drake discussing his plans to renovate the floor of the hotel James inhabits. Tristan sets his sights on his first target.

Alex visits patients and sends her measles case to the hospital. She reminisces on her own childhood, her motivations for becoming a pediatrician, and her son, Holden. His disappearance splintered her and a year into his absence she attempted suicide. She believes her daughter is trying to hurt her with her stories of Holden, but a family therapist suggests she's not trying to hurt anyone. 

When Will's friend Claudia climbs into bed to sleep she is killed by the man Hypodermic Sally sewed inside a mattress. 

John and his partner investigate a mass murder at a gossip site's office. Their tongues are all nailed to desks and the floor. John recognizes it as another Commandment murder. When he returns home to the Hotel Cortez, Hypodermic Sally's mattress man falls into his arms.

Tristan visits Will, planning to seduce and then kill his former employer. Just as Tristan opens his knife, the Countess appears and forbids the murder.

At the hospital, Gabriel tells John he didn't mean to kill "that woman" saying that he had actually intended to kill Sally for lying to him just before he codes. John returns to the hospital searching for the victim's body. Instead he finds the maid cleaning a room and Sally smoking a cigarette in the hall. During their chat, Sally mentions the Ten Commandments, which piques John's curiosity. She begins to seduce him and then he awakes, realizing it might have been a dream.

When Donovan returns to the hotel, Iris greets him with her plans to move the both of them into an apartment. He reminds her that he despises her. He once again goes in search of death, feeding on junkies to get high. While out he runs into one of the Countess' rivals and gets captured.

Alex shows up at the hotel looking for John. When she sees him fidgeting, she suggests he get a real drink then slides divorce papers across the table. He breaks down sobbing and asks her to stay because he thinks he's going crazy. 

The Countess and Will Drake sit down for a nightcap following an evening out on the town. She asks him what he thinks about dying and he confesses that his creative energies are tapped. Despite the fact that he's gay, she uses her powers of seduction to turn him on. When Tristan interrupts, she lets her lover in on her plan.

Alex sees the murder investigation on John's wall in his hotel room and blames his agitated state on his work. She gives him sleeping pills and puts him to bed. After leaving his room, she sees Claudia, covered in blood, and then Holden. She goes to him at the end of the hall and he doesn't run. 

Iris goes to Hypodermic Sally for help dying. Sally agrees but only with the promise that Iris has no unfinished business which will keep her trapped in the hotel forever. 

Donovan wakes up in Ramona Royale's house. She regales him with her tale of their twenty year love affair and how it ended when she fell in love with a man. The Countess couldn't handle her lover leaving and killed him. Ramona wants to use Donovan to get back at the Countess by taking out the Countess' children.

Donovan finds Hypodermic Sally in his mother's room and his mother on the brink of death.