"The crime is when you pay someone to engage in sexual conduct," he added.

Kimberly Mackey, who attends college in the South, says she had one Sugardaddie.com suitor pay her $500 to have lunch with him. She said she doesn't consider herself a prostitute because she doesn't have sex with most of the men she meets through the site.

The 23-year-old started engaging in relationships with older, wealthy men after moving away from home at 18. An older colleague saw she was having trouble supporting herself, so he started inviting her on golf trips with his friends and buying her gifts.

The man told her, "You're only going to be young and hot for so long. Take advantage of it while you can."

Mackey got used to the perks. She said sugar daddies have offered her cars, vacations and apartments, but she prefers cash.

Why go the sugar route?

Atlanta-based licensed mental health therapist Harrison Davis said sugar relationships are all about power and youth.

On one hand, he said, these relationships remind the men of a more carefree time in their own lives. On the other hand, there's a great sense of control.

"They can take things away and limit the amount of money they're going to spend on the young lady. They can steer (the relationship) into any direction they want to."

Though Mackey says she's not ashamed of her unconventional part-time job, she doesn't make a habit of telling everyone about it.

When her mother asks how she can afford to not work, she says her ex-boyfriend helps her pay her credit card bills, which some people might consider a sugar relationship in its own right.

Cervantes, on the other hand, said her relationship with a family member suffered after she opened up about her experience dating sugar daddies: "He said, 'You're selling your body online.'"

Despite Cervantes' qualms about accepting money in exchange for her companionship, she has no plans to deactivate her account anytime soon.

She said she doesn't have parents who can help her pay for school, so she relies on the kindness of wealthy men out of desperation.

Without the extra income, Cervantes said she'd be back at the homeless shelter she lived in for three months in 2009.

"In my heart of hearts I don't really like the situation," Cervantes said. "Right now it's a survival mechanism."

Sugardaddie.com's Pasternack said the relationship between a sugar baby and sugar daddy is all about perspective.

"I helped my wife get through school, I pay for the bills, take her on trips, buy her nice gifts," he said. "I guess you could say a lot of married guys are sugar daddies without them realizing it. I think you can say basically any guy who wants to impress a woman is a sugar daddy."