I've read some shoujo manga, just for variety, and one featured what I didn't recognize at first, but was supposed to be a love triangle. I just didn't honestly recognize it as a love triangle at first simply because one of the male characters was such a reprehensible villain (who twice tried to rape the heroine - once just sending out henchmen to rape her publicly just to humiliate her, not because of desire for sex or any sort of twisted love BS, just outright to hurt her) that I only realized he was a "romantic interest" when I saw an author's comment in the side of the page where the author was responding to getting so many letters from the female readers begging for the heroine to be set up with the vile rapist in the ending.
Up until then, I'd seen it as a story of a plucky heroine standing up against severe odds - when I realized she was actually being considered for romantic matching with the bullies who were taking turns trying to abuse her, it horrified me.
So, yeah. It can totally be written to appeal to a female audience like that.