I had a similar thing years ago in the UK. Very strong connection to someone, we often knew what the other was thinking etc. It was a very passionate relationship. We lived together for 4 years but, looking back, it started to get controlling and bordering on violent even before we bought a house together

Once we bought the house it became violent very quickly, but (because of the connection??) It felt impossible to leave him

Anyway, in the end I did leave, I had to.
A few years later I had a tarot reading from someone I'd never met before. She talked about this relationship and said that we had a soul connection from past lives BUT he had been my persecutor

She said we met in each life to learn lessons from each other.
I had the very same connection with my rat when I met him. I struggled with the very sudden and strong feelings mixed with feeling that something was very wrong. He kept telling me it's fate, that he felt he'd known me forever etc. And I believed it for a while untill gradually he started to show his true colours.
People usually translate these strong feelings of having met someone before as Love (soul mate) but it could be the oposite. Maybe we have a strong connection because they had a huge impact on our past lives in harmful ways.
After all, if we meet people we loved in past lives and feel that connection than it stands to reason that we will also feel a connection with someone that had an impact on us for other reasons.