Taking the term "free market", as it's generally regarded in moderate economics circles, at a literal sense misinterprets its actual meaning. A good analogy is Creationists who cling to the notion that because evolution is regarded as a 'theory', given the colloquial definition if it, it is in dispute.

The key point of free market is voluntary setting of prices through of supply and demand by consumers and producers generally unhindered by external forces. However, a sub-field of this, market failure, deals with exceptions to the rule.

For example, negative externalities where production is incentivised beyond societally desirable equilibrium norms because costs are not bourne or captured by the producers who produce these goods and the consumers who consume them (e.g. carbon emissions).

Alternatively it also focusses on the supernormal profits that can be borne by producers who hold too much market power in monopolistic, oligopolistic or duopoly microeconomic market structures (such as what this examples presumably is, with some rent seeking thrown in on the side).