Trouble In Triplicate Read Free Page A

hoped that his perfidious brother Grant was miserable too!
    She opened the front door just as he was about to knock, and they stared at each other in silence for a long moment. Caine Saxon was handsome, Juliet admitted grudgingly. In addition to that tall, masculine frame, nature had blessed him with thick dark hair the color of burnished chestnut, and the most unusually colored eyes that she had ever seen. They were a dark yellow-brown, an intriguing amber color that reminded her of a cat's eyes. He had a strong, square jaw and a well-shaped mouth. Bobby Lee had once remarked that Caine Saxon looked like the cowboy hero in one of those old Western movies.
    But he was no hero, Juliet reminded herself sternly. He was a rat by association with his brother.
    "Miranda?" Caine asked uncertainly.
    "Or one of the others impersonating her?" she said waspishly.
    "I'm sorry about that." He looked a bit sheepish. "But I had to know if I really was talking to Miranda. You see, I'm very worried about my brother."
    Juliet froze. "Has—has something happened to Grant?" As much as she loathed the man for what he'd done to her sister, she didn't really wish him physical harm, Juliet realized with some surprise.
    "May I come in? I don't care to discuss it on the front porch."
    Juliet led him into the small living room and sat down on the blue-and-yellow-striped couch. When Caine sat down beside her she resisted the urge to move to another chair across the room. It was because he was so big and she was so hostile to him that she was so disconcertingly aware of him sitting beside her, she told herself. He seemed to dwarf the couch, the entire room, by his presence.
    "What happened to Grant?" she asked, her voice suddenly breathless.
    "You happened to Grant, Miranda. He fell in love with you and planned to spend the rest of his life with you. And then, without rhyme or reason, you called off the wedding."
    "Without rhyme or reason? The fact that he spent a weekend in Richmond with another woman two weeks before the wedding isn't rhyme or reason enough?"
    "Miranda, do you know that until last night Grant didn't know why you'd broken your engagement? You refused to speak to him—you returned his ring by mail and left a message on his answering machine that you never wanted to see him again. He's tried and tried to see you, to talk to you, but you and your sisters haven't let him near you."
    "There was nothing he could say that—"
    "Do you realize that if I hadn't talked to that spitfire sister of yours, he still wouldn't know why you'd called off the wedding? I told him last night that the reason you broke up with him was because he had allegedly spent an illicit weekend in Richmond with another woman."
    " 'Allegedly' ?" Juliet echoed crossly. "There was nothing alleged about it, mister!"
    "How do you know, Miranda? You never gave the man a chance to explain. You tried, convicted, and sentenced him without ever hearing him out."
    Juliet thought about that. She'd urged Randi to confront Grant, but her sister couldn't bear the thought of seeing him, of hearing his lies. Randi had never been one to quarrel. Arguing and tension and raised voices could literally make her sick. She'd avoided confrontations all her life, and neither Juliet nor Olivia had had the heart to force one upon her at this most stressful time in her life.
    "Miranda, Grant was devastated by this breakup. I've never seen him like this. For the past month he hasn't been sleeping well or eating well, and—"
    "Well, neither has—" Uh-oh, she'd almost said Randi. And she was supposed to be Randi! "—uh, have I," Juliet quickly corrected herself.
    Caine held her captive with his piercing amber gaze. She shifted uncomfortably, excruciatingly aware of the hard virility emanating from him. "Let me ask you just one more question, Miranda."
    He leaned forward slightly, and Juliet inhaled the fresh scent of him, a heady mixture of soap and after-shave and pure male. She swallowed and