The Best Little Whorehouse in Louisiana

* AU. My first fic inspired from my love of Dolly, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, and a constant craving for some Paric loving. I thought about Eric being Sheriff and Pam as a former madam and the idea just clicked. I own nothing. I shall gain no profit. Eric and Pam belong to Charlaine Harris/Alan Ball. The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas belongs to whoever in hell wrote it… (it was a Broadway play first… then a film…) if I quote songs they belong to the writers… Dolly used I Will Always Love You for the film and wrote Hard Candy Christmas and Sneakin' Around for it… blah blah bases covered blah.

It's just a little bitty piss ant country place… nothing much to see….

Bon Temps was a wide spot in the road kind of town about 25 miles from Shreveport. It was the kind of place where everybody greeted each other by name and if you broke wind in the supermarket, the news would spread to everybody, their brother, and their pet parakeet before you got your groceries in the refrigerator. Everybody knew everybody else's business, but in a town of 1500 people, what else was there to know and discuss? Bon Temps was a lot like any other miniscule town down in the Bayou. It was like Mayberry… only trashier.

So as little privacy as was offered in such a place, the citizens of Bon Temps looked out for one another. The town had it's fair share of dirty little secrets. The mayor kept a flask of bourbon hidden in his desk. That teacher from the grade school hauled ass back to Arkansas after the principal knocked her up and his wife and the whole town found out about it. That short order cook from Merlotte's Bar and Grill had supposedly auditioned for RuPaul's Drag Race. Things like this were known by all but discussed by no one. (At least not in public.) The worst kept secret in Bon Temps sat a few miles outside of town. The Kitty Cat Ranch had once been a farmhouse, but for the last 70 years or so it had been home to another kind of house, and it shouldn't take a Rhodes Scholar to figure out what kind of house it was. It's name said it all.

Men had been coming and going to the Kitty Cat Ranch from all over Louisiana and parts of Texas and Mississippi for generations. It was a rite of passage for many of the boys of Bon Temps to become men there with one of its professionals. People of the town and Sheriff Eric Northman turned a blind eye to the goings on of such an establishment because the working girl turned madam who ran the Kitty Cat Ranch, Pamela Swynford DeBeaufort, was a smart business woman and quite a generous philanthropist towards various causes in town. The myriad of eclectic customers that frequented the Kitty Cat Ranch often supported other businesses in town with their patronage. Most of the women in town didn't mind the Ranch either. After all, one woman's 30 seconds of sexual suffering was another woman's night off.

One of the best kept secrets in town was that Sheriff Northman didn't just turn a blind eye to the going's on of the Kitty Cat Ranch for the good of the town. He and the madam, Pamela Swynford DeBeaufort, known as Miss Pamela to her girls and her clientele, had been lovers for years and years. As far as the people of Bon Temps knew, Eric threw himself into his job as sheriff, and didn't keep any woman around, at least not long term or seriously. However, the town that knew everything was blind to the fact that there was only ONE woman for the good sheriff, and if he could, he'd keep her forever. That just didn't seem to be in the cards for them, though. As Sheriff, Eric had appearances to keep, and cavorting around with a prostitute turned madam would ruin his career. Miss Pamela had long since given up taking paying clients, and only saw the Sheriff intimately, but she had her own show to put on for her customers. If they knew she was in a monogamous relationship, the illusion and her bad reputation would be shot to hell.

All secrets have a way of coming out, though. Whores were good at keeping secrets, and all of Pam's girls were well aware of the romance that went down in her bed room most nightly when all the clients were gone. They were also well aware that if they ever breathed a word of it to ANYBODY that Miss Pam would drown them head first in the toilet. She had a bit of a temper, that Pam. But secrets don't say secrets forever.

Eric and Pam had a long history of late night, long, exhilarating, mind-blowing trysts, and more often than not, they exhausted themselves. Most times, they were smart enough not to let sleep take both of them, but occasionally it got the better of them. On one such occasion, they had dozed off with their bodies intertwined. When Pamela finally woke, she realized that the dawn had broken, and she was probably screwed (literally and figuratively). She quickly shook Eric awake, and he sleepily pulled his pants up as Pam threw a robe on. She walked him to the front door as she always did, and he left her with a long, delicious kiss, as he always did, and the thought nothing of it. Eric bid her farewell and Pamela retired to her room for some more much needed rest. It was still fairly early in the morning, and surely no one would see them… right?

Oh, but no. A client that had visited one of Pamela's girls the night before had also fallen asleep and was busy sneaking out the back door and hoping his wife wouldn't be waiting on him with a rolling pin when he made it home. Just as he rounded the corner to make it to his truck, he saw Eric and Pam mid kiss and froze in his tracks. He couldn't let them see him… Pam would ban him from the Kitty Cat Ranch for catching him here so late…or early… you know. But what delicious news this was! The good sheriff not only exiting the WHORE HOUSE, but he had been with the elusive Miss Pamela!

Three hours later, the whole town was abuzz and scandalized by the gossip. How could the good Sheriff Northman uphold and protect the laws and citizens of Bon Temps when he was breaking the law himself? He was patronizing a WHORE HOUSE. He was patronizing the PROPRIETOR of said whore house. HOW SHAMEFUL.

The news quickly got back to Eric himself. He walked in from patrol to over hear his secretary in deep discussion with her sister on the phone. His face instantly paled and he went back to his office and immediately dialed Pam's number. He only managed two words before her end of the line went silent. "We're caught."

Pam immediately called her girls to the front parlor. "Alright, bitches. This ain't my first rodeo. I KNOW one of you let the cat out of the bag because now the whole damn TOWN is talking about Eric and me. And how do I know? BECAUSE NOBODY ELSE FUCKING KNEW. NO ONE. So where does this leave us? UP THE FUCKING CREEK WITHOUT A FUCKING PADDLE. We're fucked. FUCKED. And not only are we FUCKED, because we're so FUCKED, but Eric is also FUCKED because now the whole town knows that he knows. They'll probably call for his resignation or some other worse fucking thing. He'll probably have to leave this fucking town. And where will that leave us? FUCKED. And you know WHY? Because the next FUCKER that runs this fucking town won't leave us be. They'll shut us down. Good luck finding the good fucking corner. But you know who will be the hardest FUCKED? ME. And you know WHY? Because the man I love will be gone. My business will be gone. And what will I do with myself? When I figure out which one of you FUCKED everything up by running your FUCKING MOUTH, I will personally bludgeon you with a blunt object. Then I will take that big ol' hatchet in the kitchen and cut your body up into tiny pieces and I'll run the limbs and various organs through the meat grinder and feed you to the fucking DOG. And they'll never find the fucking body because you will be dog shit! Now get out of my sight, while I figure out what the FUCK I'm going to do!" Pam dramatically threw herself onto the sofa with a sigh as the girls scampered away in fear to their respective bedrooms.

Meanwhile, Eric was busy ignoring calls from every newspaper in the tri-county area as well as the local tv station. At the rate this news was traveling, it would be statewide by lunch time. Eric didn't see what the big deal was. He could tell the truth. He wasn't a paying customer. Really, it was all wrong, but it was alright. He and Pamela were in love. Would the public believe the truth? People have a habit of wanting to think the worst. He needed Pam. Ignoring the scathing looks from everyone in the sheriff's office, he got in his patrol car and headed for the Kitty Cat Ranch. The town be damned if anyone saw him there. Everybody knew anyway and they were already thinking the worst. Fuck it.

When he got to the ranch, he barged through the front door to find his Pamela sobbing in a heap on the sofa in the front parlor. He immediately went to sit beside her and gathered her in his arms. "Shhhh, Pam. Don't you cry… I'll take care of everything." Her tears made up his mind. He knew what he had to do.

"Pamela", he said, "Go upstairs and gather your things. I'll resign as sheriff and we'll leave this chicken shit town and start over somewhere together. Leave the ranch to one of your girls. The town will leave them alone as long as we pay the price for what we've done in their eyes. Run away with me."

Pam sobbed. Eric's offer was enticing. She loved Eric more than anything and she had always longed for a normal life for the two of them. Starting over somewhere could afford that to them and it would be paradise… for awhile at least.

"Eric, I've loved you for so many years I've lost count. And I'd love to run away with you and pretend nothing ever happened, but you're a damn good sheriff and you love your job. I can't have you giving up your whole life and existence for me because sooner or later I'm afraid you would grow to resent me for it. And that would kill me. I've been a whore ever since my mother pushed me out the door when I was 16 and said "Just be nice to the gentlemen, Pammy. They'll be nice to you." And I could give it up in a heartbeat. It makes me miserable. But you… you love what you do."

"I love you." Eric said forcefully. Before she could open her mouth to object, he scooped her up into his strong arms and carried her up the stairs. "Pack your bags, and we're gone."

She could never refuse him anything, so she did as she was told. She loved her business and girls, despite the occasional temper tantrum she threw on them, but Eric was her everything. She tearfully bid them farewell and followed Eric outside.

"Where will we go?" she asked him.

"Let's just drive until we find the place that speaks to us. As long as I'm with you, anywhere is paradise." Eric replied with a smile.

And so they did. And so it was.

THE EN