It could be satellites. The ones in equatorial orbits will travel on an east-west trajectory, generally around where the Milky Way is in the sky, if you can see that where you live. In North America, that’s going to be between 30-50 degrees north from the horizon.
Of course there are lots of other kinds of satellite orbits, but from the way you describe it, satellites in equatorial orbit seem the most likely suspect to me.
I think it must have been something like that. Even so ... very odd.