Never read Wuthering Heights, hope I never do.
If you've missed reading the Brontes, then you've missed some of the most subtle and yet dramatic writing in the English language. If you write anything with action, despair, or fear going on in it, then you owe it to yourself to read Wuthering Heights at the very least, but Jane Eyre and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall would do you well, too.
Gothic Romance is after all the parent of sword and sorcery, and the Brontes did Gothic Romance like none others. In fact, you may have missed the beginnings of "antagonistic romance" right there, although we will probably get an argument from the Jane Austen clique regarding Pride & Prejudice on that score - another one I'd guess you haven't read, but the story is so compelling, I would certainly recommend it to you.
And if you're going to read Jane Austen, go for the heavy Gothic and fun, fun, fun in Northanger Abbey.
These books might seem like they are out of your genre, but so many literay devices and sound ideas are trans-genre. So if you are looking for the roots of a romantic device, I recommend digging in the fields of the Romantic writers.