Hairdresser Leila Alavi was at work when her estranged husband Mokhtar Hosseiniamraei asked her to meet him in a western Sydney car park on Saturday morning, say colleagues.

But the apprentice, aged 26, walked down to the Auburn car park and never came back.

After she failed to return to Benjamin Hair Studio, a colleague went to see if she was still talking to her husband downstairs.

Screams echoed throughout Auburn Shopping Village when the co-worker found Ms Alavi dead inside her Holden Astra.