Protective scout freely relaxed? (9)
I believe the answer is:
custodial
'protective' is the definition.
(similar in meaning)
'scout freely relaxed?' is the wordplay.
'freely' indicates an anagram.
'relaxed?' becomes 'dial' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'scout' is an anagram of 'custo'.
'custo'+'dial'='CUSTODIAL'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for custodial that I've seen before include "Involving protective care" , "Pertaining to protective care" , "Relating to protective care" , "concerning imprisonment" , "Like sentence" .)