My initial gut reaction is that you saw a meteor enter the atmosphere pointed right at you. I've see two of these and they freaked me out as that is not the expected normal behavior. That said there is a ton of stuff up there. At my friend's place in the country it is not uncommon to see upwards of two dozen satellites of various brightness if we are up for several hours.

Being that bright, 10+ time brighter than Venus currently, I'd second guess that it could have been a plane/helicopter at a distance from the observer; usually lower in altitude with an inversion layer at the point of the light. What was the weather like? clear skies? Upper level clouds? Oh I got your weather, and it does not look like an inversion layer echo. How long are we talking about? Seconds? Minutes?